


Cinderfella

by GoldenTruth813



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Boys Kissing, Carnival Games, First Dates, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff and Smut, Getting Together, Intercrural Sex, Keith is snarky, Lance & Keith BROTP, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Meet-Cute, Romance, Shiro (Voltron) is a Dork, Switching, Virgin Keith (Voltron), Youtube AU, blink and you'll miss it soulmate au, lance is the best wingman
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-15
Packaged: 2020-01-06 14:59:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 43,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18390731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldenTruth813/pseuds/GoldenTruth813
Summary: Takashi Shirogane is exactly the kind of man Keith likes; built like a brick house with a smile sweet enough to rot teeth and a heart of gold. Of course he’s also YouTube famous and worlds out of Keith’s league. The closest he can get to his pseudo-celebrity crush is when he watches Shiro’s videos from the safety of his bed. Or so he thinks.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to whiskyandwildflowers for talking me down when I worried I would ruin my idea and all of the invaluable alpha help and to TDCatsblog for putting up with all my snippets and being the best beta ever.
> 
> This universe is really special to me. This fic was born out of a little HC thing I posted to tumblr and twitter and I was shocked by the way people responded to it., Hopefully if you read that before this, you enjoy this fic and if you're coming into this fic with fresh eyes well I hope you like it too. <3
> 
> Also this fic is completely finished and edited and part 2 will be posted in about a week. :)

The morning was clear and bright, the blue sky full of puffy white clouds, and the birds singing, as Keith trudged down the sidewalk bemoaning all of it.

“Fucking seven a.m. shift,” he grumbled to himself, pulling his baseball cap down over his head to block out the early morning sun in his eyes. No one should have the misfortune of being awake and dressed that early. Especially not on a Saturday. Normally Keith took the late afternoon shifts since no one wanted to be around early morning Keith, including Keith himself. Unfortunately, Hunk had called in with a migraine, which meant Keith was stuck covering for him.

Logically Keith knew he shouldn’t be so cranky about having to work that morning. In the ten months since he’d started working at Castleship Coffee he’d been lucky enough to only have to deal with the opening shift a handful of times — something that was made possible by Hunk offering to cover them when he found out Keith wasn’t a morning person. Keith had been hesitant to accept the job since he was not well-suited for customer-service oriented positions. Except jobs were scarce, and without a college degree and little work experience outside of his stint as a bagger at the Whole Foods in high school followed by a year at community college before he’d dropped out, he didn’t have the luxury of being picky when Lance offered to help get him a job.

Keith had expected to hate the job and, well, he did sort of hate the job. People were fucking weird and insanely picky when it came to their drinks. Like the man who had once insisted there wasn’t enough milk in his decaf triple espresso macchiato that he’d specifically ordered with no milk, or the ones who were sure Keith had purposefully given them whole milk than normal in their flat white because they swore they could see an eighth of an inch at the top of their coffee cup instead of the usual sixteenth they swore was the norm. Or the absolute control freaks who made Keith promise to take exactly fifty seconds to pull the shots as if he had nothing better to do than get a timer to make a cappuccino. It wasn’t like Keith made about a hundred coffees and a day and knew what he was doing or anything. Then there were the weirdos who ordered a latte breve or a shot in their chai latte. By the second month, Lance had told him to stop questioning the way people wanted their drinks and just make them. Problem was, Keith had never been good at doing what he was told.

Granted, some customers were nice, but most of them made his eight-hour shifts feel like eight weeks, and he always went home smelling like he’d taken a bath in coffee. Keith didn’t even like coffee.

But as far as jobs went it wasn’t the worst. He liked his coworkers even if they made him crazy sometimes, and the pay was more than fair for an entry-level job. He also really liked that the owner, Coran, usually let Keith take home the day-old baked goods that didn’t sell.

Keith might not have been a big fan of coffee, but he fucking loved baked goods, especially the ones Hunk baked up for the coffee shop that included everything from hazelnut cream croissants to s’mores rice crispy treats; egg puffs with gouda and bacon; and a lemon and pistachio pound cake that Keith was absolutely certain was better than sex. Not that he’d had sex, but if he had, he was pretty sure it would still top it.

A stray cat darting out of the alley and right across his path interrupted his musings. He jumped back, barely avoiding falling over the cat, but stepped in a giant wad of chewed-up bubblegum instead. Just his fucking luck.

“Fucking great,” he grumbled, nose wrinkling up in a frown as he dragged his Converse against the curb trying to get the sticky pink goop off the bottom of his shoe. “Fuck.”

“Oi, asshole. You’re late,” an unfortunately familiar voice yelled.

Keith looked up to see Lance standing in the open doorway, hands on his hips as he tapped his foot. He was wearing his bright blue hat and apron already, and his name badge was proudly displayed front and center.

“I’m not late,” Keith lied, dragging his foot against the curb once more and watching ribbons of the pink gum stretch between his sole and the curb.

Lance made a loud noise in the back of his throat. “It’s five minutes after seven, you lazy fucker. What did you do, stay up late all night playing video games?”

Keith flipped Lance off, not sparing him a look as he pushed past him to get into the coffee shop. He knew Lance would rub it in. Fuck, sometimes he wondered why Lance was his best friend.

Lance let out a bellowing laugh. “Still sore you lost then, buddy?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. You must’ve had one crazy dream if you thought you beat me,” Keith insisted, staunchly refusing to revisit his embarrassing and untimely death in their game of Paladins of Voltron the night before. Technically, Lance had beaten him with an arrow to the heart and a whopping eight extra points. Keith refused to admit to the loss even though Lance had taken a photo of the television and set it as his Instagram and Facebook profile photos

“I won’t rat you out to the boss for being late if you call me the name.”

“No,” Keith answered, moving behind the counter. He walked towards the small break nook in the corner, hanging up his leather jacket and pulling on his apron which, unlike Lance’s, was wrinkled and missing his nametag.

“Come on, I beat you!” Lance said, leaning back against the counter and crossing his arms over his chest.

“Just shut up and make the drip coffee before the first customer of the day comes in and wants to know why we’re not ready,” Keith said as he tried and failed to rub out the excessive wrinkles in his red apron.

“First of all, _Sunshine_ , I made the drip fifteen minutes ago and if you had been here like you were supposed to be helping me get ready, you would’ve known that. Second of all, where the hell is your nametag? How are the customers going to be able to call you by name if you don’t wear it?”

“I don’t want them to call me by my name,” Keith replied, ignoring the first question.

“That’s bad customer service, my man,” Lance said, pushing off the counter and piling the last of the blueberry and lavender scones from the baking sheet into the display case.

“Look, the last time I wore it some rando said, ’Keith has anyone ever told you that your eyes look like the ocean after a hard rain?’”

“That’s romantic,” Lance argued, not bothering to turn around and instead rearranging the mice-shaped sugar cookies Hunk had added to the menu last month. Keith hoped that at least one of them would be left over when his shift finally ended.

“It is not romantic. It’s creepy and delusional that everyone seems to think they’re going to find love in a coffee shop. Fucking Hallmark channel. Besides, the sea after a storm looks like a toxic waste dump site. That’s not romantic.”

“You are so fucking hard to please, Kogane. What kind of man would it take to—”

“Shut up. Customers,” Keith hissed, straightening his baseball cap and ducking back behind the espresso machine. Keith was technically scheduled to work the register, but they both knew Lance was better with people than he was since Lance was made up of ten percent brutal honesty, thirty percent doesn’t know when to shut up, and sixty percent pure bullshit.

“Good morning and welcome to Castleship Coffee. It’s a beautiful day and I’d love to make it even better for you. What can I help you with today?” Lance asked, plastering on his biggest smile. The woman, who looked to be in her mid-forties, blushed as she ordered a nonfat vanilla latte before shoving a five-dollar bill in the tip jar.

Lance turned and winked at Keith.

Keith groaned. Fuck but today would be a long day.

 

****

**~~~~~~**

“Keith. _Keith_ ,” Lance hissed, the same way he’d been hissing Keith’s name since the last customer walked out of the coffee shop with their ridiculously complicated espresso drink. Keith continued to ignore him.

Keith watched out of the corner of his eye as Lance straightened the display of paleo protein bars by the register, something he did multiple times a day since the customers seemed incapable of not picking up the nicely packaged bars up to read the ingredients while they paid for their coffee.

Lance sighed loudly, the unmistakable crinkle of plastic filling the store as he grabbed one of the protein bars moments before he chucked it at Keith’s head. Keith had all of two seconds to react, lifting his hands in a failed attempt to block his face as a date and bison bar whacked him square in the forehead before falling to the floor with a thud.

“What the fuck, man?” Keith yelled, retrieving the bar and tossing it back on the counter before giving Lance a withering look that did nothing but make Lance smile.

“You were ignoring me.”

“I was working,” Keith corrected him. Technically, he’d been pretending to reorganize the coffee syrups for the second time that day, but Lance didn’t need to know that. “Unlike some people.”

“You were not. There are no customers, and there haven’t been for ten minutes.”

Keith closed his eyes and took three steadying breaths. He had fewer than fifteen minutes left in his shift, and all he needed to do was survive the rest of it without incident before Pidge and Romelle came in to cover their shifts. He was so close to surviving this day.

“I just wanted to know if you wanted to play Paladins again tonight. I’ll even let you pick your player first, give you a fair shot at possibly beating the master. I mean let's be real, the odds are stacked against you and you’ll probably lose miserably and spend your entire day off tomorrow wallowing in your shame and disappointment, but the least I can do is give you a head start so you’re not at such a huge disadvantage.”

“Fuck. You.”

Lance clutched his hands to his chest dramatically, swaying as if he’d been physically wounded. “You know, I’m going to think you don’t like me if you keep being so mean to me.”

“I don’t like you,” Keith insisted. It was a lie, and they both knew it.

“My dude. My man. My buddy,” Lance chirped, walking over and throwing one long, lanky arm across Keith’s shoulder and leaning against him, “you’ve been saying that since we were in third grade. You’re a horrible fucking liar and you love me. Admit it.”

He poked Keith in the side as if to prove his point.

Keith felt his lip twitch, and he bit down on the inside of his cheek hard to keep from smiling as an image of a nine-year-old Lance with grass-stained knees and dirt on his nose punching a fifth grader for making fun of Keith for not having a mom flashed through his mind. Lance was obnoxious and loud and sometimes made Keith want to scream. He was also hilarious and kind and the most loyal person Keith had ever met. Keith wasn’t about to tell him any of those positives since Lance already seemed to hold the option that he hung the moon and stars, If Keith let Lance know in actual words how much he liked him then there was a very good chance that Lance’s head would get so big it might not fit through the fucking door.

“I will not admit it and you can’t make me,” Keith said stubbornly, shaking off Lance’s arm.

“My word, you’re a grumpy little gremlin this morning.”

“I am not. It’s not my fault all of us aren’t meant to function at stupid o’clock hours of the day.”

“It’s almost three in the afternoon,” Lance countered.

“Yeah well, I’m still recovering from having to wake up so early this morning. Cut me some slack,” Keith said, grabbing a rag and wiping down the already clean counter in front of the espresso machine so he had something to do. It wasn’t Lance’s fault Keith had slept like shit, was feeling more anxious than usual, and had forgotten to bring his lunch from home and was fucking starving.

Lance shook his head, walking over the register and ringing something up before pulling a five-dollar bill out of his pocket.

“What’re you doing?” Keith asked, momentarily pausing his fake cleaning to watch Lance.

“What needs to be done,” Lance said, popping the five in the drawer and pulling out his change before moving to the display counter and plucking out the very last mouse-shaped sugar cookie and handing it to Keith.

“Oh,” Keith said quietly, taking the cookie without argument. The mouse was the size of his palm, was frosted in white, and was ornately decorated with trimmings of pastel pinks and blues. Even its tiny whiskers had been added on in small strokes of black icing. Keith ignored Lance’s shit-eating grin as he took a huge bite of the cookie, almost sorry to eat it. It was crisp and sweet and so good Keith’s eyes fell shut as he let out a small noise of appreciation.

“Fucking knew you were hangry,” Lance crowed triumphantly. “Get your blood sugar up then let me know if you’re ready to lose tonight.”

“Thanks,” Keith mumbled around a second mouthful of the cookie, feeling only remotely guilty he was inhaling it instead of savoring it.

“Please tell me you ate breakfast,” Lance queried, moving around Keith to grab one of the ceramic mugs and filling it with the drip coffee employees could drink for free. He passed it to Keith without a word.

Keith shrugged, swallowing down a mouthful of the cookie with the first drink of coffee. It was warm and soothing, and Keith felt some of his agitation melt away. Lance was like his mom in that way, always shoving food at Keith and assuming it would solve everything. Granted, nine times out of ten it usually worked since Keith was notorious for either forgetting to eat or running out of food money because he spent his entire paycheck on parts for the 1969 Mustang Boss he’d been painstakingly restoring for the last few years.

“So are you coming over tonight? Veronica is going on a date and my mom is making lasagna and fresh garlic knots so there will be tons of food. Then afterward I’ll let you attempt to regain some of your lost honor and dignity.”

Keith licked away the crumbs on his lips, popping the last piece of sugar cookie in his mouth as he weighed the offer of Mrs. McClain’s incredible home-cooked meals with the possibility of being beaten by Lance two days in a row.

“I can’t. I have plans,” Keith said.

“Plans? Without me? What are you doing?” Lance asked, looking genuinely offended.

“I could have plans without you,” Keith shrugged. He didn’t really want to admit to Lance that his only plan was eating a frozen dinner and watching YouTube all night. Not that he didn’t want to hang out with Lance or have lasagna, it was just that it was Saturday. Saturday meant a new video from his favorite Youtuber. Normally Keith watched the new videos from the comfort of his bed. Unfortunately, today’s morning shift had made him miss his weekly routine. The fact that Keith was refusing actual human interaction in favor of watching someone on YouTube and had been in a bad mood all day because of it made him feel like a bit of a loser, which was why he didn’t want to tell Lance.

“No, you couldn’t,” Lance balked. “I’m your best friend!”

Lance’s words weren’t far off from the truth. The only other people Keith ever hung out with were his coworkers, and that was always in a group that included Lance. Most of the time he didn’t even do his own grocery shopping alone since Lance was always looking for an excuse to get away from his parents’ house and his many siblings or cousins who were always over. Keith was pretty sure Lance spent more time in Keith’s poky one-bedroom apartment than he did in his own home.

“I have things I need to do, is all. I gotta clean.”

Lance pulled a ridiculous face. “You never clean. Your place looks worse than a frat house on a Friday night.”

Keith flipped him off, taking another chug of his coffee.

“Just ‘fess up and tell me what you’re doing. You know you’re either going to cave and tell me yourself later, or I’ll find out on my own with my incredible skills of deduction. Either scenario ends in me knowing the truth. Come on and just tell me what’s better than mom’s lasagna and video games with your favorite person in the entire world. Huh?”

Keith sighed. Lance was probably right. Keith was notoriously bad at keeping secrets, and Lance was even more notoriously the world’s nosiest person alive.

“IwannagohomeandwatchShiro’snewvideo,” Keith said rapidly hoping Lance might not have caught it all.

The bell above the door chimed indicating they had a customer, but unlike usual Lance didn’t immediately spring into people pleaser mode and instead continued to stare open-mouthed at Keith.

“ _Shiro_. Takashi Shirogane? That YouTube person you’re obsessed with?” he all but shrieked. “You’re gonna bail on a Saturday night with your best friend to jack off to your YouTube crush?”

“Shut the fuck up, we’re not alone,” Keith hissed. He couldn’t see anyone from his place behind the espresso machine, but he could hear the footsteps nearing the counter. 

“Who’s jacking off to whom?” Pidge asked, slamming her canvas satchel down on the counter. “And you’re lucky it was only me and not a customer. You need to learn to keep your voice down,” Pidge told Lance with a pointed look.

“Keith is canceling on me tonight so he can get his rocks off to that YouTube guy he’s obsessed with.”

Keith groaned, wishing the world would swallow him up. “I’m not obsessed with him.”

“Yes, you are,” Lance said. “You got an Instagram just so you could follow him which I know because you still haven’t followed me back. You’re also subscribed to his channel and know way too much about him.

“I notice you didn’t deny you’re gonna jack off to him,” Pidge interjected, moving behind the counter to stand beside them. Immediately she turned her back on them and grabbed a green ceramic mug before filling it with coffee. Unlike Keith, she put as much half and half and vanilla syrup as actual coffee in her cup.

“What?” she asked when she turned around to find Keith and Lance both staring at her.

“Do you want any coffee with that sugar?” Lance asked.

“Yeah, I don’t even know if that counts as coffee,” Keith agreed.

“Just because we don’t all drink our coffee as black as our souls because we enjoy the tangible taste of bitterness on our tongues doesn’t mean we’re drinking coffee wrong, you judgemental shitheads. Besides, we were talking about Keith.”

Keith frowned. He’d very much hoped the topic of conversation had been successfully changed.

Pidge and Lance both stared at him expectantly, and Keith sighed, removing his hat and running a hand through his hair. “It’s Saturday.”

“We all know what day it is. What is that supposed to mean?” Pidge asked.

“Shiro uploads new videos on Saturdays. Well, he sometimes uploads them on Mondays too for _Microwave Mondays_ or a compilation of an entire day for _A Day in the Life_ or even a random motivational video. But Saturdays are the one day a week you’re guaranteed a new video.” He trailed off when he realized that he did in fact sound completely and pathetically obsessed.

“Wow,” Pidge whistled. “You’re even more pathetic than I thought.”

“Says the girl who reprograms computers for fun and once spent a week camping in the desert alone trying to pick up alien signals,” Lance scoffed.

“First, that makes me smart. Second, aliens are real, and third, Keith knows I was only joking. Right, Keith?”

Keith nodded. He knew Lance and Pidge didn’t actually mean anything when they teased him about his crush on Shiro. The problem was they didn’t need to make fun of him for him to feel like an idiot about it. He knew that there were probably thousands—fuck probably more like tens of thousands—of people who had a crush on Shiro if his three million subscribers and silver play button were anything to go by.

Not that Keith thought everyone who watched Shiro’s channel had a crush on him. He’d skimmed the comments enough to know that there were many people who followed Shiro’s lifestyle channel just because they liked Shiro as a person. He’d read many stories of people suffering from PTSD or disabilities who found comfort and hope in Shiro’s progress and recovery. There were just as many who couldn’t relate personally but said Shiro’s motivational videos and positivity had encouraged them to live a better life or be kinder to themselves and others. Of course, for every comment on what an inspiring and genuine person Shiro was there were just as many trolling his website telling him he wasn’t as good as he thought or making lewd comments about his appearance and what they’d like to do to him.

Despite it all Keith, Shiro had never changed. Keith had only been watching his channel for about a year but he’d binged every video he could find when he first found Shiro’s channel so he knew the struggles the other man had overcome when he’d started video blogging during his recovery from a near-fatal piloting accident that ending in the loss of his arm and some scarring.

The first few videos had been poorly edited with bad lighting and sound, but something in Shiro had been captivating. There was something painfully earnest and open about him, and Keith had spent the entire night awake unable to close his eyes as he’d watched a stranger bare his soul to the entire world. As the dates on the videos became more recent Shiro’s eyes grew brighter, and there was an undeniable strength building in his body and his heart as he poured a part of himself and his fears and truths into his video diaries.

Along with the progress in his physical and mental health came progress in his videos as Shiro apparently learned how to shoot them without moving too much or how to get the best lighting or edit out bloopers. It was easy to see why Shiro rapidly gained followers.

It wasn’t until a video of Shiro doing martial arts shirtless went viral that his channel really took off, which incidentally was exactly how Keith had found him. Keith wasn’t gonna lie, Shiro had been hands down the most beautiful man Keith had ever laid eyes upon and that alone had made up at least sixty percent of the reason he’d gone on YouTube to look him up after seeing a clip on the news. The rest of the reasons, however, had to do with his awe at the strength and flexibility in Shiro’s movements and his curiosity about the scars and prosthetic. Keith had watched the video of Shiro’s perfect roundhouse kick at least a dozen times before he admitted to himself it was less to do with the move itself and everything to do with the man doing the move.

Keith was in lust.

Two days later Keith was in love. Or as close to love as someone could get when it was a one-sided internet crush. In infatuation maybe. Keith didn’t like to spend too long thinking about his feelings if he could help it.

Shiro’s body looked like it had been sculpted out of marble. He had a shoulder-to-waist ratio that would’ve made Captain America cry, abs harder than steel, and a jaw that could cut diamonds. He also had a shock of white hair with a floof that fell into his eyes, the softest smile Keith had ever seen, and a voice like honey.

It wasn’t just his appearance that had Keith’s heart beating faster though. Shiro was painfully open and honest on his channel. He was unexpectedly funny and even more unexpectedly a complete nerd who often wore NASA shirts and made dad jokes.

Keith had made an Instagram and YouTube account that weekend solely to follow Shiro, something he’d stupidly admitted to Lance the next day at work. Later he would blame his confession on sleep deprivation because there was no other logical excuse for him giving Lance so much ammo to tease him with.

And tease him Lance had. Lance had made fun of Keith endlessly about being in love for the first time. Keith wasn’t stupid enough to think it was actually love, but Lance wasn’t far from the truth in his estimation that Keith pathetically wished it was. He knew it was stupid to feel that kind of affection towards someone he’d never met, but something about Shiro made Keith want to tear down his own walls.

Despite the months of ribbing, Keith held his ground and insisted that he didn’t have a crush, but the truth was he definitely did. Keith figured it wasn’t really his fault though. Anyone with eyes would be attracted to Shiro, and all you needed to do was watch a few of his videos to see that there was so much more to him than just his looks. He was the complete package.

Whether Keith was watching Shiro accidentally explode an entire package of peeps for Microwave Monday, or metaphorically ‘tagging along’ as Shiro ran errands or did his meditation during an A Day in the Life video, or sometimes even falling asleep to one of the newer ones from Shiro’s Positivity Popcorn series, Keith felt _happier_. He felt as if he knew Shiro. There weren’t many people Keith could say that about.

Privately Keith thought that was exactly what made certain people on YouTube so intriguing and captivating, and why the trend of YouTubers becoming bonafide celebrities in their own right had become more prevalent over the last few years. Youtube stars invited people into their lives and sometimes even their homes. Keith could experience someone else’s life without having to go outside of his comfort zone. Realistically Keith knew that there was probably a lot of editing behind the scenes, and there was a good chance Shiro wasn’t as perfect as he appeared, but the fantasy that Shiro and many others created made Keith’s life better for a scant half hour a week, and that was something Keith treasured.

“You could come over to my house and watch it with me,” Lance offered, interrupting Keith’s thoughts and bringing him back to reality.

“Why? You said you hate YouTube stars,” Keith asked.

Lance rolled his eyes. “Technically, what I said was that YouTube stars were fake and if anyone deserved to be famous, it was me. Besides, I’m your friend. What kind of ulterior motive do I need to invite you to my beautiful home and enjoy a well-cooked home meal?”

“So you’re jealous,” Pidge supplied. Keith noticed she was now drinking out of a new mug and wondered when the fuck she’d finished her first coffee and got a second cup without him noticing.

“Technically, it’s your mom’s home,” Keith added.

“First of all,” Lance squawked, “if anyone is being jealous of anyone, then people are jealous of _me_. I know it’s hard to be friends with someone who is so naturally charismatic, flawlessly attractive, and funny. Second of all, fuck you.”

“I don’t have any friends like that,” Keith said.

“The only person I know like that is me,” Pidge agreed.

Lance’s entire face turned down in a frown and his shoulders slumped as he trudged towards the corner. “You two are so fucking difficult. Why am I friends with either of you?”

“Well, for what it’s worth I’m in. I don’t get off until nine though, so you can’t start without me.  
It wouldn’t be fair.”

“Who invited you?” Lance barked, clearly still a bit put out as he hung up his hat and apron. He looked like a kicked puppy.

“I’m always invited by osmosis, obviously,” Pidge said. “Because you’re so nice.”

“You would never abandon a person in need of food and friendship. You’re too honorable,” Keith agreed, unable to stand the sight of Lance’s frown.

“Yeah, and you’re really handsome too, you know, if you’re the type of person who is attracted to perfection, which I’m not,” Pidge said, somehow keeping a straight face through her bullshit.

Keith was proud of himself for managing not laugh at the way Lance stood taller, his shoulders going back as he nodded. He was so easy to please.

“You’re both right. I am fucking nice. And handsome.” He preened, running his hand through his hair and puffing out his chest.

Keith grunted as Pidge’s elbow unexpectedly hit him in the side. He rubbed at his ribs but cottoned on. “Oh yeah, dude. Way more than either of us.” The last bit was added on with heavy sarcasm that completely escaped Lance.

“So you’re in too then, mullet?” Lance asked, looking hopeful.

Keith paused to think. Agreeing meant having to wait another six hours to watch Shiro’s new video and the probability of being roasted by his closest friends. But it also meant one less night sitting in his apartment alone and food that didn’t come out of a box with a shelf life long enough to last in outer space.

He supposed waiting another few hours was a small price to pay for a night with his friends a full belly.

“I guess I could stand to stare at both your faces again.”

“Sweet,” Pidge said, thunking her second empty mug down in the sink when the bell above the door rang to signal customers.

“You coming over now then?” Lance asked.

“Nah, I’ll stay and help Pidge until Romelle gets in, then I’m gonna go home and take a long nap and a shower.”

“That’s code for you’re going to go home and wank yourself raw to thoughts of your Prince Charming,” Lance whispered, not quite quietly enough if the furrowed eyebrows of the two customers in line were anything to go by. He waggled his eyebrow.

“Fuck you, I am not,” Keith grumbled, doing his very best not to blush. There was about a ninety-nine point nine percent chance he absolutely had planned to get himself off before he went to visit in the hopes that might lower the odds of him getting inappropriately turned on watching Shiro.

“Would you two zip it and make the flipping coffee,” Pidge hissed, shoving two cups into Keith’s hand.

“Arrivederci,” Lance said with a dramatic bow and wave of his hand before he sidestepped his way towards the back exit. “See you later, dude, and don’t you dare bail on us.”

Keith blew away the stray strand of hair that had slipped out of his baseball cap and into his eyes and sighed heavily.

What the actual fuck had he gotten himself into?

 

****

**~~~~~~~**

At five past nine Keith pulled into the McClain residence, the tires of his cherry red motorcycle kicking up rocks in the long driveway as he flipped off the engine and parked in front of the garage.

It’d been a few weeks since he’d made enough time to come around to Lance’s, what with his extra shifts at work and most of his spare time spent alone in his own garage fixing up his car. He walked the winding brick pathway, a smile curling at the corner of his lips as he took in the familiar potted plants that lined the porch and the large wooden plaque that hung by the front door that read _Everyone is family here_. He exhaled a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding and smiled for the first time all week.

After his dad had passed away in his junior year of high school, Keith had been in danger of heading into the foster care system, but the McClains had offered him up their spare room and their family. Lance’s family had already been like a second family to him since he and Lance had been too small to reach the rooster-shaped cookie jar stocked full of biscotti and chocolate chip cookies Mrs. McClain always kept next to the fridge.

Though nothing could’ve eased the pain of losing his father, Lance’s family had tried. he money had occasionally been tight, but the food and affection had never been in short supply.

It didn’t matter how many times Mrs. McClain had told Keith he could stay with them as long as he wanted, Keith had still gotten his own apartment once he’d turned eighteen and had enough money saved up. It had always worried him that he might infringe on the kindness of other people or overstay his welcome. And no matter how much he liked Lance’s family, their home was always loud and boisterous, and Keith was desperate for the kind of quiet and privacy he was used to.

He pulled off his helmet, plopping it down on the bike seat before walking towards the front door and lifting his hand to knock. Before his knuckles could even collide with the knocker however, it was being yanked open and Mrs. McClain was pulling him into a bone-crushing hug.

“You’ve been away too long, Keith,” she said. Her perfume was achingly familiar and though she was at least half a foot shorter than Keith, he let his head drop onto her shoulder as he relaxed into the embrace.

Keith hugged her tightly. “Sorry.”

“You don’t need to apologize just me, dear. Just remember you’re always welcome here. Besides you’re the only one who can keep Lance in check,” she told him, pulling out of the embrace to stare at Keith, her hands on his cheeks. “You’re not eating enough. Come inside.”

Keith laughed, following her inside. “Yes, ma’am.”

The moment Keith stepped through the doorway he was immediately bombarded by several of Lance’s little cousins who always seemed to be around, attaching themselves to his legs like tiny koala’s as he made his way to the kitchen, feet dragging on the hardwood with the extra weight.

Fifteen minutes later he’d finally escaped the small circus of kids, assured Mrs. McClain he wasn’t starving to death in his bachelor pad—which was at least seventy percent truth—and made his way upstairs and towards Lance’s bedroom at the end of the hallway with a massive plate of food. He was pretty sure Mrs. McClain was trying to make up for not being able to feed him for three weeks by serving him enough lasagna and garlic knots that he might never be hungry in his entire life again. Keith was not complaining.

He shoved his soda can under his arm and balanced the plate in his left hand as he pushed open the door to find Lance and Pidge had apparently started watching videos without him. Lance’s massive computer monitor was pulled to the edge of the desk and turned sideways to face his double bed—the screen paused on a rather flattering shot of Shiro doing a shirtless handstand, his shorts obeying the direction of gravity and slipping down to reveal the expanse of rather thick thighs—where Pidge and Lance were sitting cross-legged and arguing.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Pidge said incredulously around a mouth stuffed full of lasagna, “you seriously don’t think this dude is hot?”

Keith slipped inside, shutting the door behind him.

“Shiro. His name is Shiro,” Lance corrected, flipping Keith off the moment he noticed him. “And I suppose he’s passable. Nice of you to show up by the way. I heard your motorcycle ages ago. Please don’t tell me you were flirting with my mom this entire time.”

Keith ignored his insinuation, returning the rude gesture.

“ _Shiro_ ,” Pidge singsonged, swallowing her food and brandishing her fork at Lance like a broadsword. “And you’re a fucking liar.” She turned her eyes on Keith, look softening as she smiled. “Hey.”

“Hey, guys,” Keith returned.

“I’m not a liar. Shiro isn’t that hot!” Lance insisted loudly. He puffed out his chest and postured his shoulders, a clear sign he was, in fact, lying.

Pidge rolled her eyes at Lance before turning her gaze on Keith as he sat at the head of the bed, leaning his back against the wall and setting his plate of food down in front of him, staring down at the aliens on Lance’s comforter. He couldn’t believe Lance still had the same bedding he’d had since he was twelve.

“Keith, you think he’s attractive, right?” she asked. From the look in her eyes it was clear she knew but wanted Keith to confirm her suspicions.

Keith hummed noncommittally and nodded, peeling back the layer of baked cheese off the top of his lasagna with the tip of his fork and stuffing it into his mouth. It would take twice as long as the pasta to chew and therefore prevent him from technically being able to answer any more questions. Attractive didn’t even begin to cover what he thought of Shiro.

“Keith wants to have Shiro’s babies,” Lance chirped. “Well, you know metaphorically since he’s a dude and can’t get pregnant.” He turned his eyes on Keith and flipped him finger guns.

Keith’s mouth was still too full of chewy mozzarella to speak, but he hoped his narrowed eyes sufficiently conveyed the fuck you he was mentally sending Lance.

“Not all forms of attraction have to be linked to procreation. That’s so heteronormative,” Pidge said, swiping Lance’s last garlic knot off his plate and shoving it into her mouth before he could object.

“I suppose there’s something intriguing about him if you go for that kind of thing,” Lance conceded, leaning back and stealing one of Keith’s garlic knots.

“And by type you mean men who look like they could bench press you with one hand but also have an apparent heart of gold and a not-so-secret dorky side so that you’re not painfully intimidated by their god-like level of of attractiveness.”

“He’s not _that_ attractive,” Lance complained, stabbing his lasagna hard enough his fork scraped the plate with an unnerving scratching sound.

“Not that attractive,” Pidge snorted. “I mean he’s not my type. But even I am honest enough to admit he’s a fine specimen of the human species. He has a particularly pleasing face. I’ve never seen anyone with such a symmetrical jawline.”

“I’m just saying he’s not that special. Lots of people are good looking. Yours truly for example,” Lance said, holding his hands out. “Hey Keith, you’d fuck me right?”

Keith choked on his lasagna.

“I’m serious. Like you’re gay. If I wasn’t dating Allura, you’d wanna fuck me, right?”

“You’re not dating Allura. You’ve only met her a few times,” Pidge corrected before she stuffed her face with lasagna, humming innocently.

“Whatever, that’s a minor detail,” Lance said waving her off. “We’ve had meaningful conversations, okay. We’re clearly on the same wavelength. We’re also both unnaturally beautiful people who can appreciate the beauty in others. It’s only a matter of time before we’re officially dating. Besides you’re distracting Keith from the point of this conversation.”

“Which is?” Keith asked.

Lance rolled his eyes. “That I’m more attractive than this Shiro dude. So come on, Keith, be honest. You’d do me right?”

Lance turned his attention back on Keith who popped open his soda and took a deep chug of Coke, coughing at the burn of carbonation. Lance continued to watch him expectantly.

“No,” Keith finally said. “Sorry.”

“What? You’ve got to be kidding me! I’m your favorite person in the entire world. Are you seriously telling me not once in the last ten years have you been at least a little bit in love with me? You must have thought about it at least once, right?”

Keith blinked in surprise, ignoring Pidge who sounded like she was having a fit.

Lance had that same look in his eyes he’d had when he asked Keith if they were best friends in fourth grade, or the time he’d asked Keith to help him start a Pokemon club in seventh grade when the eighth graders wouldn’t let him join theirs. A look that was somehow full of confidence but also the expectation of being let down.

The last time he’d seen Lance look that had been two weeks after Keith’s dad had died and Lance had offered to steal his mom’s car and take Keith anywhere he wanted to go in a last-ditch attempt to make him smile. _‘We could make a go of it, just the two of us, if you need,’_ Lance had whispered. They’d only made it as far as the Dairy Queen two towns over that night, but Lance had made him smile at a time when he’d felt certain it wasn’t possible. Lance was the best friend Keith had ever had, but not once had he thought of him as something more. If Keith wasn’t absolutely positive that Lance was head over heels in love with Allura and had been since the day he’d laid eyes upon her, he might’ve worried about their current conversation. As it was, Keith chalked it up to one of Lance’s bouts of insecurity.

“I mean, maybe I had a small crush on you once, but that was a long time ago,” Keith lied, trying not to smile at the way Lance’s ears went red and he ducked his head.

“See, I knew it,” Lance mumbled, voice uncharacteristically bashful. “Everyone loves me.”

“I’d totally fuck you too if I didn’t have zero desire for sexual intimacy,” Pidge chimed in.

“See, was that so hard to be honest, you two,” Lance choked out, leaning over the edge of the bed to retrieve the wireless mouse and mouse pad from the floor.

Pidge gave him two thumbs up over Lance’s back and Keith bit back a laugh, his chest swelling with an unexpected gratitude for his friends.

“Got it!” Lance crowed victoriously, holding up the mouse like a trophy. He plopped the mouse pad down on the bed and scrolled, changing the video from the one he and Pidge had apparently been watching before Keith arrived, to Shiro’s main channel.

“Right, so we’re looking for the newest video,” Lance said, more to himself than anyone else as he read video titles. “Wow, this guy really likes alliteration. Smoothie Saturday. Positivity Popcorn. Microwave Monday. Taekwondo Tuesdays. Space Sundays. Wow. What a dork.”

“It’s cute,” Keith said without thinking.

Pidge and Lance turned their eyes on him comically fast.

“ _Cute._ Did Keith Kogane, the reigning king of cynicism, just call something cute?” Pidge gasped.

Keith cleared his throat and tried to ignore the heat he felt rushing to his cheeks. “I can think things are cute. It’s not that unusual.”

“It is fucking too that unusual,” Lance challenged, switching the screen view from popular uploads to all videos. “Well, I suppose the end is near. Gonna see a flying pig soon. Ah-ha, here it is. Day In The Life uploaded at ten forty-two this morning.”

Keith shoved more lasagna in his mouth to keep from making any embarrassing noises. Day In The Life videos were by far Keith’s favorite, and Shiro hadn’t uploaded one in a few months. He was well-aware it was bordering on pathetic, but there was something undeniably soothing about seeing glimpses of Shiro’s daily life, tangible evidence that he was, in fact, a real person like Keith who had to go grocery shopping and get gas. Granted, his Day In The Life videos often included things like the time he’d gone free climbing in Yosemite, or got a chance to tour NASA, so he wasn’t exactly like Keith or anyone else. But still.

“Why the hell is the video twenty-nine minutes? That seems excessively long,” Lance questioned.

“I mean, it’s an entire day condensed into a single video. What did you expect?” Pidge asked, leaning over to grab the mouse and click play.

The well of tension in Keith’s stomach unfurled the moment Shiro’s voice filtered out from the speakers.

“Hey, guys. So it’s been awhile since I’ve uploaded one of these kinds of videos for you but I’ve been getting a lot of comments on YouTube and Instagram the last few weeks asking for another Day In The Life video, so here we are,” Shiro laughed, pulling the camera back enough that Keith noticed that Shiro was in bed— _his_ bed. “I’m trying to keep it real for you guys so I apologize for my just woken up state, but you know...I just woke up.”

Shiro winked as he pulled the camera back far enough that Keith could make out Shiro’s hair splayed across a soft-looking grey pillowcase. Near his shoulder was his slumbering cat who lifted its head, took one look at the camera, and turned around so its butt was the only thing visible.

“Black is not a morning person,” Shiro laughed. It was only then that Keith realized the dying whale noise had come from him as Shiro rolled over and out of bed. The room was dimly lit, but it was good enough for Keith to see the pillow lines still on Shiro’s cheek, his white floof a complete disaster, and his shirt noticeably missing.

Fuck.

“He named his black cat _Black_ ,” Lance said with a disbelieving shake of his head, unaware of Keith’s internal panic. “Well, he’s not exactly original is he?”

“Says the asshole who named his favorite childhood blue stuffed lion _Blue,_ ” Keith snorted, lifting up the pillow beside him. As expected, the pathetic-looking stuffed lion that Lance had slept with since the day he’d got him for his seventh birthday was lying there hidden. He picked it up and shook it, the left ear dangling precariously on its last threads.

“You leave Blue out of this, you fucktard,” Lance yelled, snatching the lion and hugging it against his chest. “Don’t let the ugly man scare you, Blue.”

“Oh shut up, I can’t hear Shiro,” Keith grumbled, chucking a garlic knot at Lance’s head. Lance’s reflexes were too fast and he snatched it, popping it into his mouth and giving Keith a thumbs up as he happily chewed.

By the time Keith realized he’d been distracted from the video, and he looked up to see Shiro puttering down his hallway, the sound of his feet on the hardwood echoing as he walked into a brightly lit kitchen.

“As you guys may or may not have noticed, I managed to get the kitchen redone since the last time I shot a video in here,” he said, propping the camera up on something as he moved around the kitchen and began to gather his supplies for making coffee. “And before the comments start to roll in, I know I always get grief for the way I take my coffee so I’m just going to pretend none of you are watching me do this.”

Keith wrinkled his nose in disgust as Shiro held up a hazelnut flavored coffee pod in front of the camera and waved it around before popping it into his white Keurig. He poured a generous amount of Snickers coffee creamer and dumped in two packets of sugar into his large white coffee mug. The mug had the NASA space logo on the side, but instead of NASA it read “Queer” with a rainbow shooting star streaking across the top.

“Hold the fuck up,” Lance hollered, pausing the video and turning accusatory eyes on Keith.

“You didn’t tell me he was gay! You’re holding out on us!” He shrilled.

“I have to agree with Lance. That is important information to withhold,” Pidge said.

“See, even Pidge agrees with me! That never happens. How the hell did you fail to mention that this guy you’re crushing so hard on is gay. This changes everything!”

Keith’s stomach dropped. “Uh...no it really doesn’t.”

“Yes, it does,” Pidge argued as she turned sideways to stare at Keith.

“Here I thought you had a hopeless crush on an obnoxious straight dude. And now...well, it’s possibly still a hopeless crush, but it’s like five percent less hopeless now that we know he isn’t straight.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s still hopeless,” Keith disagreed, giving up any pretense of pretending he didn’t have a crush. “Besides you know how many thousands of people probably have a crush on him. I know nothing will ever come of it and that’s fine. It’s just a silly little crush, alright.” He poked at the last bit of lasagna on his plate until it looked like it’d been chewed up and spit out again.

“You never crush on people,” Lance said, his voice unmistakably even. Keith looked up to find Lance watching him.

Keith shrugged even though Lance was right. He could recall on one hand the number of actual crushes he’d had in his life, and the number of people he’d actually dated had been even lower than that.

Not that Keith never found people attractive, because he did. It was just that finding someone attractive and being attracted to them were different. Having crushes always made Keith feel vulnerable in decidedly uncomfortable ways. He didn’t enjoy wanting or needing people, because it left you open to being hurt, and Keith had been hurt enough in his life, thank you very much. Avoiding relationships was simple self-preservation, which was exactly how he’d let himself get such a massive crush on Shiro. Because nothing would ever come of it, liking Shiro was safe.

“Look, it doesn’t matter, just drop it,” Keith insisted. “It’s not like anything will ever come of it.”

“Right, so we’re just going to ogle Shiro from afar and not talk about the fact that you’re in love,” Lance said, more of a statement than a question.

“I’m not in love. I don’t even know him,” he sighed. He knew that the things he thought he knew about Shiro from his channel were enough to get a sense of the type of man he was and what his character was like. But he was under no delusion that he really knew Shiro.

“But you’d like to, right?” Pidge said with a raised eyebrow. She had that look in her eye she got when she was ready to be right.

“Oh my god, you guys are relentless,” he groaned, shoving his plate to the side and pulling his knees up to his chest. “Fine, yes. Yes, sometimes I jerk off to thoughts of Shiro. Yes, I want to have his metaphorical babies, heteronormative or not. Yes, I have a crush on him. But nothing will ever happen so it doesn’t matter. Are you two happy now?”

“Wow Keith, I feel so close to you right now,” Lance said opening his arms. “I can’t be the only one thinking it’s time for a group hug right now.”

“Yes, you can,” Pidge said, scooting backwards.

“Hug this,” Keith said, chucking the bed pillow at Lance’s head. Lance groaned in surprise as it slammed into his face, and he barely avoided slipping backward off the bed. He hugged the pillow to his chest and peered at Keith with a look of utter betrayal.

“Fuck you both if this is how my kindness and support are repaid,” Lance grumbled.

“Just put the video back on, you lemon head.” Pidge said.

Lance stuck out his tongue at her but compiled without argument, reaching for the mouse and clicking the play button.

Keith bent his head down to rest his chin upon his knees as he watched the screen, barely hearing Shiro’s words as he moved from his kitchen to his small office with his cup of coffee in hand. Shiro dropped down to sit at his desk, which drew Keith’s eyes to the bookshelves lining the walls behind him, rows and rows of books, with a surprisingly large number of science fiction figurines, miniature space models, and YouTube awards. The video sped up as Shiro answered e-mail and internet comments, and his increasing affection for the man in front of his eyes struck Keith again.

The time lapse went on, rapidly moving from morning to afternoon. By the time Shiro had disappeared for a shower and returned wearing a dark purple henley that clung to him in all the right places and well-fitting jeans, Keith was weak in the knees.

Shiro continued to narrate his day, and Keith continued to ignore Pidge and Lance’s inane and unnecessary background commentary ranging from the ratio of his shoulders to waist, the size of his thighs, whether they thought he was more the type to give or receive in bed, and whether he was a real space nerd or a wannabe space nerd who thought liking NASA made him cooler.

Keith didn’t bother telling them that Shiro’s body resulted from intensive daily workouts to handle the extra weight from his high-tech prosthetic and deal with PTSD and depression he’d suffered because of the airplane crash that had cost him his arm during a routine skydiving trip a few years prior. He didn’t tell them that Shiro’s weekly thigh workouts were so intense because, as he’d once confessed, he had recurring nightmares about losing his other arm and being helpless.

He didn’t tell them that Shiro was definitely a _real_ space nerd, whatever the fuck that meant. Or that Shiro had been an undergrad excelling in his college’s astrophysics program and on track to enter the space program when he’d lost his arm and his dream of going to space.

He didn’t tell them any of that.

“I suppose I can see the appeal,” Lance finally conceded once the video was over.

“There’s a lot to like,” Pidge agreed, pulling a Jolly Rancher out of her shirt pocket. She noisily pulled off the plastic wrapper before dropping it onto the floor and popping the bright green candy into her mouth.

“Yeah,” Keith echoed as a red Jolly Rancher was unceremoniously shoved into his hand without a word. “A lot to like.”

A lot to like didn’t even begin to cover it, and Keith’s thoughts swirled as Lance insisted they needed to watch one more video just to be sure they were getting the full Shiro effect.

Keith slowly unwrapped the candy, pocketing the trash and watching as Lance picked a Microwave Monday episode from a few weeks ago where Shiro had attempted to doctor up his favorite Stouffer’s macaroni and cheese.

Shiro’s smiling face covered the screen, and Keith pushed the candy past his lips and sucked on it hard.

 _It’s all right_ , he thought to himself. It was just a harmless crush.

 

****

**~~~~~~~**

The frigid night air nipped at the exposed skin just above the collar of his jacket as he leaned into the turn, his motorcycle skimming low against the pitch-black pavement. He exhaled a soft sigh as he rounded the corner and saw the wide stretch of moonlit road before him was blessedly empty. Unable to contain his excitement, he let out a whoop as he revved the engine and increased his speed, confident there were no cops patrolling there at that time of night.

After three hours of watching Shiro’s channel and countless ribbings from his friends, Keith had purposely taken the long way home from Lance’s house once he’d finally left. The extra gas it took to drive the abandoned old trucker route that went around the outskirts of town and through the desert was well worth the promise of a long stretch of land all to himself. Granted, this particular road was usually sparsely occupied to begin with, but at night that was magnified tenfold.

There was something majestic about being out on the road alone at night with no one for company but himself and the stars above him. He liked speeding down the single lane road so fast he could almost pretend he was flying—his wheels chasing the moon’s shadow as the endless horizon stretched out before him. He felt limitless.

Keith’s own apartment was dead center in the middle of the city. From his bedroom window he could hardly see the stars, which were eclipsed by the million street lights and the bright neon glow from the twenty-four hour liquor store across the street. The location was shit, but the price was low, and the one bedroom apartment had miraculously come with its own detached garage. Keith had signed the lease papers on the spot—desperate for his own space to finally start restoring his dream car. Of course that didn’t mean that Keith didn’t take every chance he got to drive his bike out towards the winding desert roads, most at peace when the orange and yellow hues of sunset blurred with the red soil—the line between the ground beneath his tires and the sky becoming meaningless. 

All that existed was forward. Faster. Farther. 

Everything felt within his grasp.

Those thoughts swirled through his mind as he took notice of of a dark shape looming in the distance, something that most definitely shouldn’t have been there. He tightened his grip on his handlebars as he slowed closer to the actual speed limit. He neared the unidentified shape in less than a minute, turning his head to the side long enough to see a broken down Camaro. It wasn’t until the car was behind him that he realized two things: One, there was a man sitting in the car, and two, there was absolutely no cell reception out there.

 _Don’t do it_ Keith thought to himself, continuing to barrel down the road. The guy was probably fine, and if he wasn’t there was likely a seventy percent change he was a serial killer.

Unable to stop himself Keith looked back over his shoulder, the car and its mysterious occupant long gone, but Keith couldn’t shake the nagging feeling in the back of his mind. He knew from personal experience that this long stretch of road was basically a dead zone. Regardless of what cell company the guy had there was almost no chance he’d have service out here, and the odds of another human being passing him by in the next eight hours were slim to none.

With an audible sigh he flipped a shitty, burning tire tracks into the pavement beneath him as he drove in the opposite direction. He slowed down as he got closer, the car falling into his line of sight in just a few minutes.

“Please don’t be a murderer,” Keith muttered to himself, kicking up rocks as he pulled onto the side of the road just feet from the man’s car. He pushed down the kickstand with his boot as he reached for the small knife in his back pocket, just in case, when a voice Keith would have known anywhere rang out in the silence of the night.

“Oh, thank god you turned around. I’m not going to lie, I was starting to panic a little bit. When you passed me by I thought for sure I was going to be stranded out here all alone and sleeping in my car, and between you and me I don’t think that would have been the most comfortable of solutions.”

Keith kept his hands steady as he reached for his helmet and pulled it off, cursing the fact that his hair probably looked ridiculous as it fell with stray bits falling into his face. He tried to remember when the last time he’d showered was. Possibly the day before yesterday, but he couldn’t be sure when the last time he’d probably washed his hair with more than water was. Figured fate would hand him the man of his dreams when Keith probably looked like a wild racoon.

He very much wished he’d not eaten three servings of lasagna and garlic knots because they were threatening to come back up as he struggled to breathe.

“Right, sorry. I should introduce myself,” the man offered when Keith said nothing. “I’m Takashi, but my friends all call me Shiro. I’m uh...hoping you turned back around because you thought you could help me?” He shoved his hands into his pockets and smiled hopefully at Keith.

Keith continued to stare stupidly, trying to wrap his brain around what he was seeing.

Shiro, the YouTube star he’d just spent the last few hours watching with Lance and Pidge and whose very existence had caused Keith more than one emotional crisis was standing in front of him. In the flesh. An actual real person. 

Standing wasn’t really the right way to phrase it. _Leaning_ was more accurate. Shiro was leaning back against the hood of his broken-down car and dressed in a plain grey hoodie with the NASA logo on the chest. Instead of the usual blue constellations behind the logo there was an array bright rainbow stripes. He was also wearing a pair of snug-fitting black leggings that had Keith adjusting himself on the seat of his motorcycle as he took in the visible stretch of the fabric over Shiro’s strong thighs and the small peep of pale skin at his ankle just above his plain black sneakers.

Keith was so focused on Shiro himself it took him longer than it should have to notice the beauty of the car he was leaning against. Keith let out a whistle as he dismounted his motorcycle and walked closer, taking in the pristine condition of the fully restored 1969 black Camaro. He was particularly taken by the sleek matte paint job that was understated and far sexier than any car had a right to be. Especially with Shiro leaning against the hood. Everything about the car screamed _powerful_. It suited Shiro perfectly.

“That’s a nice car,” Keith said softly, his appreciation for the Camaro overriding his initial shock.

Shiro grinned. “Thanks. I just got her last week. It was a belated birthday present to myself. I’ve wanted this car since I was seventeen. I promised myself one day if I could ever afford it I’d buy it. I’d almost given up hope of finding one until I saw this beauty at a car show. She cost almost as much as my apartment, but it was worth it. Well, I thought it was anyway. I didn’t expect her to break down on our first long ride together.” He patted the hood of the car.

“Her,” Keith queried with a raised eyebrow.

Shiro scrubbed his prosthetic hand across his face and offered Keith a wry smile. Even in the dim moonlight the pink flush that spread across his cheeks was visible. “Don’t laugh at me alright, but I give my cars names.”

“And what’s her name then?” Keith asked, inching closer. 

Keith’s eyes honed in on Shiro’s face, memorizing the sharp line of jaw and the elegant curve of his nose. Up close he was even taller and more muscled than he seemed in videos, which was surprising, and Keith felt awed to realize Shiro was even more attractive in person. There was a liveliness in his face and an elegance to the way he moved that not even the camera could catch.

Keith hoped Shiro couldn’t hear the sound of Keith’s heart threatening to beat out of his chest as he tried to swallow down the rush of emotions and confusion crashing down upon him like a tidal wave. Fuck. There was no mistaking it. This was definitely _the Shiro_. The same Shiro that Keith had been watching for nearly a year. The same man whose positivity made it easier for Keith to face his bad days and whose coming out video had given Keith the strength to officially tell his friends he was gay even if they said they’d already known. He didn’t just have a crush on Shiro, he admired him, and the reality of standing before him had Keith unsure if he wanted to stay here forever or run far away before he did something he regretted.

“Atlas,” Shiro answered. “I know it’s traditionally a boy’s name, but I don’t put much stock  
in tradition. Plus she's a strong thing,” he said, rapping his nails on the hood of the car.

“I bought her from a retired army general. I guess he’d found the car abandoned on a piece of property he bought in an auction. The car was basically scrap metal at that point, and everyone told him to just get rid of it, that the car could never be nice as it once had been. But he said he just knew there was a second life in her. He spent three years restoring it completely on his own.”

“Why’d he sell it then?” Keith asked, unable to imagine him ever parting with the Mustang in his garage. He couldn’t fathom pouring that much of himself into a car simply to sell it.

“To be honest I couldn’t tell you. The car wasn’t even for sale when I saw it at the car show. I started talking to the guy, told him it was my dream car and what an amazing job he’d done restoring it. To be honest, though, I think we spent more time talking about me then the car now that I think about it. I guess he was familiar with me.” At this Shiro ducked his head looking almost bashful. “I have a YouTube channel, and I guess he’d seen it before. Anyway the guy, Kolivan was his name, told me to come back around to see him when the show was over if I wanted to take it for a test drive. I thought for sure he meant as a passenger, but two hours later I was driving Atlas down the highway. It was exhilarating. When we got back Kolivan asked if I was serious about buying her and gave me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Drove her home that night.”

Keith blinked in surprise at the casual way Shiro had mentioned his own channel. He’d gotten the impression that Shiro was fairly humble, but looks could be deceiving. Keith knew enough about YouTube and endorsements and sponsored videos to know that Shiro was one of the more successful YouTubers out there and not only made a fair bit of money on his channel but had spun it into notoriety for his Instagram and his small line of motivational products whose proceeds all went to a local animal shelter. Yet here was Shiro acting as if it were nothing, not at all trying to flout his money or success.

“So, uh, what seems to be the trouble?” Keith asked, finally getting near enough to Shiro that he could smell his cologne. He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, the musky scent mingling with the fresh night air in a way that was purely intoxicating. 

“You know how to fix cars then?” Shiro asked, hopping off the car and moving to the side.

Keith bent down, reaching beneath the hood until he felt the release. He turned to give Shiro a smug look as he popped the hood open. “I know enough.”

Shiro watched him closely, a smile toying at the corner of his mouth. “How do I know you’re not going to fuck my car up beyond repair?”

“You don’t,” Keith said, unzipping his leather jacket and pulling it off. He looked around for somewhere to put it and saw Shiro’s hand outstretched. “Thanks,” he mumbled, watching as Shiro laid the jacket safely over the open window of the driver’s side door. 

“Wouldn’t wanna get any grease on that jacket. Not everyone can pull off red leather,” Shiro said.

Keith’s eyes flew up from the engine to Shiro’s face, trying to decode if he was teasing him. 

“I like red,” Keith said, a bit more defensively than normal as he began to poke around the engine.

“It suits you,” Shiro said. Out of the corner of his eye Keith noticed Shiro eyeing his equally red motorcycle parked a few week away with clear interest. 

“Thanks,” Keith mumbled, face heating as he realized that no, Shiro was not making fun of him.

“So I didn’t catch your name,” Shiro said a moment later, leaning his hip against the car and watching Keith intently. He crossed his arms across his chest and images of how cut Keith knew Shiro was beneath the bulky fabric slitted through his mind.

“That’s because I didn’t tell it you,” Keith found himself saying as he twisted open the cap on the oil and pulled out the dipstick.

“Ouch,” Shiro laughed.

“I didn't say I _wouldn’t _tell you. Just that I hadn’t yet. I don’t give my name out to just everyone, you know,” he said, busying himself in the engine. What the fuck was he doing? Was he flirting with Shiro? Maybe Lance was right and Keith had taken one too many falls off his motorcycle and really had done some permanent brain damage.__

__“And what, pray tell, do I need to do to earn your name then, red. Is it okay if I call you red?” Shiro asked, wrapping his hands around the edge of the hood and leaning his significantly larger body frame into Keith’s personal space. Keith had never minded being bumped less in his entire life._ _

__“Guess you’ll find out,” Keith shot back, surprised at playful timbre of his voice. He purposely avoided looking at Shiro as he reached into his back pocket and pulled out a wad of napkins, cleaning off the dipstick before resheathing it and then withdrawing it once more to check the oil level. “Well, it’s not your oil. Was it doing anything before it stopped working? Any chugging or strange noises?”_ _

__“I don’t think so. I mean...I might have had the radio blasting so loud that it's possible it was and I didn’t hear it. It just chugged and then bam, stopped working.”_ _

__“You’re lucky nothing exploded,” Keith told him, recapping the oil and scooting to the other side of the engine to check the rest of the car's fluids. “So what were you listening to? Let me guess…Monster & Mana,” he said neutrally, glad Shiro couldn’t see his face in the dark. It was probably unfair to pretend to play a guessing game with an answer he already knew from Shiro’s YouTube channel, but Keith had never said he played fair._ _

__Shiro let out a laugh, the rumble in his chest audible to Keith’s sensitive ears. “How the hell did you guess that?”_ _

__Keith stood back up, wiping his hands on his jeans and fighting back a smile. “Lucky guess.”_ _

__“Bullshit,” Shiro laughed, and though he looked amused Keith had a good idea that Shiro wouldn’t let this one go. “Have you seen my channel?”_ _

__“Why, you some kind of celebrity or something?” Keith joked, taking in the way the moonlight glinted off Shiro’s white hair and feeling his breath catch in the back of his throat. Shiro looked like a dream, except that not even Keith’s imagination could make up something this incredible._ _

__Shiro’s face took on the same pinkish tinge as he sat back on the edge of the hood. “Fuck, I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not some conceited asshole I swear. Just...it’s not a very popular band.”_ _

__Somehow Keith felt unable to stand the abashed look on Shiro’s face and the next words that fell from his lips came out without an ounce of forethought. “My best friend Lance is a little bit in love with you. It’s kind of pathetic, to be honest, but...I might’ve seen a few episodes before when he made me watch it with him.”_ _

__“Ouch. Made you watch it, huh? Not a fan then?” Shiro asked. He crossed his feet, the pale jut of his ankle bone visible._ _

__Keith’s stomach flipped. Fuck, he kept shoving his foot in his mouth. He’d gone from not wanting to sound like a creepy stalker fan to making it sound like he didn’t like him at all._ _

__“What? No. Shit, sorry. I didn’t mean it like he _made me_ made me. No one can really make me do anything I don’t want to do, to be honest.” Shiro looked like he was trying not to laugh, but Keith couldn’t seem to get his own mouth to stop moving. “You’re definitely fine. I mean more than fine, like you’re above average.”_ _

__“Thank you, I think,” Shiro said scratching his jaw and tilting his head to the side slightly as he watched Keith._ _

__“Fuck, I’m just gonna look at your engine,” Keith mumbled, wishing a black hole would swallow him whole. Figured he’d unexpectedly meet the man of his dreams and somehow manage to insult him in fewer than five minutes. Sometimes he wondered how he managed to have any friends at all with the way things just came out of his mouth. He leaned down to try and find the timing belt, pretty sure that couldn’t be the problem but needing to do something to avoid looking at Shiro._ _

__Keith had never believed in karma or fate before, but at that moment he very much wondered what horrible thing he’d done in his life to deserve this type of life-altering embarrassment._ _

__“See anything?” Shiro asked a few minutes later._ _

__Keith shook his head, continuing to poke around. “Not yet, everything looks fine. Your belts look brand new, your fluid levels are good, and the plugs all looks perfect.”_ _

__“Huh, weird,” Shiro mumbled._ _

__“When was the last service date?” Keith asked, still refusing to look at Shiro and instead trailing his eyes over the pristine engine trying in vain to figure out what in the hell could have made it stop running. The least he could do after making an ass of himself was manage to fix Shiro’s car so he didn’t have a completely horrible memory of Keith._ _

__“Uh...I don’t know. I didn’t ask,” Shiro said, a tinge of embarrassment evident in his voice._ _

__“Did you take it in for a full service check before you bought it?” Keith asked, finally turning his head to peer at Shiro._ _

__Shiro shook his head. “Was I supposed to? Kolivan said everything was perfect.”_ _

__Keith made a disbelieving noise in the back of his throat. “You can’t just take people at their word. He could've been lying to rip you off. I mean look, it broke down after a week!”_ _

__Shiro shrugged. “I like to believe the best in people. He seemed trustworthy.”_ _

__“You can’t just trust everyone you meet, you know,” Keith said, unable to stand Shiro’s grey eyes on him. No matter how much he’d admired Shiro’s positivity and conviction in his videos, a part of him had been terrified it was all an act. It appeared that Siro was every ounce the optimist he seemed. It made Keith curious if the other things he thought he knew about Shiro were true or not._ _

__“I’d rather be hurt by someone than be the one who hurt them because I didn’t trust them,” Shiro said._ _

__It was such an unbelievably Shiro thing to say that it made Keith’s head spin as the reality of the situation crashed down upon him once more. He was tempted to pinch himself to make sure he hadn’t fallen asleep at Lance’s and was having a dream._ _

__“So are you a mechanic then?” Shiro asked him a moment later, apparently too polite to let the awkward silence suffocate them both for too long. “You seem to know an awful lot about cars.”_ _

__“I mean compared to you that’s not exactly difficult,” Keith replied automatically, snapping his mouth shut the second the words were out. Fuck._ _

__Keith stood back, mouth falling open to apologize but Shiro burst out laughing._ _

__“Oh my god,” Shiro huffed, leaning sideways as he laughed harder, his entire body shaking with the force of it. “That was brutal.”_ _

__“Sorry,” Keith said automatically._ _

__Shiro shook his head. “Don’t apologize. I like it. You’re honest. And funny,”_ _

__“How do you know?” Keith asked, mesmerized by the lines that gathered at the corners of Shiro’s eyes when he smiled._ _

__“I can just tell. I’m a good judge of character.”_ _

__“Right,” he said, blowing the fringe from his eyes. “I’m not a mechanic. At least not in terms of employment. I’m a barista. I’m fixing up my own dream car in my spare time, though. My dad was great with cars. He taught me everything I know.”_ _

__“Sounds like a cool guy,” Shiro said._ _

__“He was.”_ _

__“Ah, I’m sorry,” Shiro said kindly, picking up on Keith’s meaning._ _

__Keith shrugged, wiping his hands on his jeans. For once he was grateful that nothing he owned was nice enough that a little bit of grease would ruin it._ _

__“So—” Shiro started but Keith cut him off._ _

__“Can I see your car keys?” Keith interrupted, a ridiculous idea blossoming in his brain._ _

__“Sure,” Shiro answered, fishing them out of his hoodie pocket and handing them over to Keith without question. Shiro really was way too trusting. Keith had the most irrational desire to urge Shiro to be more careful around strangers, but he knew it was none of his business._ _

__“Thanks.”_ _

__The tips of Keith’s fingers brushed along the warmth of Shiro’s palm as he took the keys, swiftly moving to the driver’s side of the car and opening the door. He grabbed his leather jacket and chucked it in the backseat to get it out of his way, sliding the key into the ignition and turning it._ _

__The car made a rhythmic choking sound and Keith’s previous hunch suddenly didn’t seem as ridiculous as it had thirty seconds ago. Wanting to be sure, he turned the key again and leaned against the horn. The car made a soft _honk honk_ noise as it attempted to turn over. Keith looked down at the dashboard and confirmed his suspicions._ _

__“Yeah, see. It just won’t start,” Shiro said, appearing at the open door and squatting down to watch Keith. “Don’t suppose you’ve got any cell service do you? I might have to get it towed.”_ _

__He smiled ruefully, blissfully unaware of the reality that this entire situation was his own fault. If it were anyone else Keith would be ripping them a new one for being an absolute moron. Instead, Keith was the one who felt like a moron because he apparently found Shiro’s absent-mindedness and lack of car knowledge adorable._ _

__“Shiro,” Keith began, his annoyance at spending the better part of half an hour getting covered in car grease at war with incredulity that someone as smart and capable as Shiro could be so useless. “Your car isn’t broken. It’s out of _gas_.”_ _

__“No,” Shiro deadpanned. “I think if my car was out of gas I’d know.”_ _

__Keith moved one foot out of the car as he swiveled his hips to face Shiro. “Yes, you are.”_ _

__Shiro then did the most unexpected thing possible and pouted. “I can’t be out of gas. That would be so fucking embarrassing.”_ _

__He looked so put out it was almost comical._ _

__“I mean, on the bright side it’s cheaper to get a tank of gas than replace classic car parts,” Keith offered. “I’m sure anyone could uh….forget how much gas they had and think their car was broken in the middle of nowhere.”_ _

__He tried to smile reassuringly but if the way Shiro’s pout deepened it definitely wasn’t working._ _

__“I filled up a few days ago and I only went to the gym and Whole Foods. Well, actually I did go to the Whole Foods two towns over because ours was out of the protein powder I wanted. And now that I think about it, I might’ve run out to Petco last night to get my cat some treats. But I definitely should’ve had enough gas to get out here and—” Shiro paused, his eyebrows furrowing in clear thought. “Shit, I’m out of gas! Oh my god I’m so embarrassed,” he cried, burying his face in his hands._ _

__Without thinking Keith leaned out of the car to pat Shiro on the back, repressing a shiver at the contact. “It’s alright, could’ve happened to anyone,” he lied._ _

__Shiro widened his fingers, peeking at Keith from between his massive hands. “You’re just saying that to be nice.”_ _

__“I’m not that nice,” Keith said._ _

__“Shit,” Shiro groaned again, dropping his butt down into the dirt and covering his face completely again. “This is the most embarrassing thing I’ve ever done. I swear to god i’m not usually this forgetful.” His voice was garbled behind his hands, his shoulders hanging._ _

__“There’s a gas station about ten miles down the road. I could go and get you some gas,” Keith offered._ _

__That got Shiro’s attention and he dropped his hands into his lap, looking up at Keith. His cheeks were red and there was an apologetic smile on his face. “I’m so sorry, Red. I’m sure you have better things to be doing at midnight than helping out some stranger.”_ _

__“It’s not a problem,” Keith assured him. This time it was not a lie. “Just sit tight and I’ll be back soon alright?”_ _

__Keith stepped out of the car and over Shiro who was still sitting on the ground. He heard the rocks shuffling and a door slam. When he looked back over his shoulder it was to see Shiro had stood up and was following behind him. “How far away did you say it was?”_ _

__“Not that far. They should have some gas cans too. I’m sure you're not the first person to run out of gas way out here. I’ll hurry, promise. It’s not like i’m gonna leave you stranded out here. Thought you trusted me,” Keith teased, walking backwards until his knees hit his motorcycle._ _

__“It’s not that,” Shiro said, looking unsure what to do with his hands. He finally settled for shoving them in his hoodie pocket. “I don’t like being out here all alone.”_ _

__“What were you doing out here before?” Keith asked. “Pretty sure you were alone before unless you’ve got a body stuffed in your trunk.”_ _

__“Don’t laugh at me, but I was trying to find a good spot for stargazing. Ophiuchus was supposed to be visible tonight.”_ _

__“Weren’t you doing that alone?”_ _

__Shiro shrugged. “Yeah, but that’s different. I had something to do. A clear task to focus on. Star watching is really zen for me. I like to bring my charts and record what I see. But now? Now i’m just sitting and waiting. And to be perfectly honest with you I’m not good at having nothing to do. It makes me a little jittery.”_ _

__“Are you asking if you can come with me?” Keith whispered, heart racing and dick twitching as he imagined Shiro’s broad chest pressed up behind him as they sped down the highway. It was like one of Keith’s greatest wet dreams come to fruition, and he was grateful he had something solid against his back lest his legs gave out._ _

__Shiro, misinterpreting Keith’s reaction took a step back. “I’m sorry, that was too forward. I get it, you don’t know me. I didn’t mean to overstep. I really do appreciate all your help. I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t stopped to save me.”_ _

__Keith licked his lips and reached behind him to grab his helmet, holding it out for Shiro. “You can come.”_ _

__“Oh,” Shiro breathed, an unmistakable rush of pleasure filling his face. “Are you sure?”_ _

__“I’m sure,” Keith answered, feeling anything but. He knew it’d be easier to go it on his own. He could drive faster, wouldn’t have to worry about doing something stupid to embarrass himself, and yet despite those very logical reasons to go it alone he couldn’t imagine a world in which he didn’t take any opportunity to have Shiro by his side. Besides, he figured, this was going to be the one and only time he ever got the chance to be near Shiro, so he might as well make the most of it._ _

__“Thanks,” Shiro said, popping the helmet down on his head. He flipped the visor up, bits of white floof sticking out as he stared at Keith. “Wait, what about you?”_ _

__“I’ll be fine, it’s not far and I’m a safe driver,” Keith answered. He’d never bothered getting a second helmet since he never let anyone else on his bike—a fact Lance had given him much grief over since he’d bought the bike. Shiro looked unsure but Keith just grinned at him, moving to straddle the bike. “Well, you getting on, star boy?”_ _

__Shiro’s mouth was blocked behind the helmet, but his eyes crinkling up were more than visible. Keith could imagine the hidden smile and felt his chest flush with warmth as Shiro flicked the visor closed and climbed on behind him. Shiro fidgeted behind him, and Keith did his best not to groan as hard warmth of his body moved against his own. It was clear that Shiro was trying to figure out how to give Keith some space while also making sure his ass didn’t fall off the back of the bike, a feat that was damn near impossible. Especially for someone of Shiro’s girth._ _

__Keith was grateful Shiro couldn’t see his face as he knocked the kickstand up with the heel of his boot and opened his mouth. “Put your arms around my waist and hold on tight.”_ _

__There was a two second pause where Shiro sat motionless as Keith turned on the ignition and revved the engine, then Shiro’s chest was slotted firmly against his back as long arms wound around his front. Clearly taking Keith's words at face value, Shiro held on tightly as Keith picked up his feet and began to drive._ _

__It was an entirely new experience for Keith, who’d never ridden with anyone behind him. He’d always assumed it would dampen the sense of freedom he felt on his bike, but Shiro’s warmth at his back was solid and comforting in a completely unexpected way. It almost scared Keith how much he liked it—the thud of Shiro’s heart beating against his back, Shiro’s large palms spread flat across his chest, Shiro’s thighs bracketing his ass and the backs of his own in warmth. It was intoxicating and heady and fucking horrible because it was never going to happen again._ _

__Shiro wasn’t on Keith’s bike because they were friends—or god forbid more—but because he’d been stranded on the side of the road and desperate for help. Sure Shiro was being nice to him, but Shiro was nice to everyone if the thousands of videos and kind comments on his channel were anything to go by. It was in Shiro’s very nature to make other people feel good._ _

__Keith was nothing special._ _

__As the road whizzed beneath them Keith become increasingly morose, and by the time they were pulling into the small gas station on the side of the road the only bigger than the cloud of negativity settling over Keith’s brain was his arousal._ _

__Keith slowed down, pulling in next to the first pump and turning off the engine. A second later Shiro’s hands were on his hips steadying himself as he slid off the bike as he moved to stand beside the bike and pull the helmet off. Shiro’s hair, which had been perfectly tousled before, was now sticking up at odd angles, the floof in the front smashed down across his forehead. Keith barely resisted the urge to reach out and push it back._ _

__“Wow, that was fun,” Shiro said a bit breathlessly, his eyes alight with excitement. “I can’t believe I’ve never been on a motorcycle before. Clearly I’ve been missing out.”_ _

__He tucked the helmet under his left arm, ruffling his hair with the prosthetic in a futile attempt to fix it. It still looked like a disaster, but Keith wasn’t about to tell him that. Privately he rather liked being able to see Shiro undone a bit like that, wondering how many other people got to see him so unguarded like this. There was a difference between watching Shiro on his phone or computer and seeing him in person, a subtle difference to the way he held himself._ _

__“You’ve never been on a bike before?” Keith asked, somehow surprised by the revelation. He’d always assumed that Shiro was a bit of an adrenaline junkie like he was._ _

__“Nope, you were my first,” Shiro said._ _

__Keith felt breathless,, his chest fluttering rapidly as Shiro stood there smiling at him, completely unaware of the effect he was having on Keith. _Fuck_._ _

__“I uh, I gotta go to bathroom. You get the gas,” Keith blurted, barely waiting for a soft okay from Shiro before he dismounted the bike and hurried to the bathroom around the back. He grimaced as he entered, wondering who the hell had been the last person to take a piss in there as he walked to the sink and flipped on the water._ _

__“Fucking idiot,” Keith muttered to himself, the graffiti on the mirror scarring his reflection._ _

__His cheeks were red and his hair as big of a mess as Keith himself was. He cupped his hands and moved them beneath the running water, cold water pooling before he leaned down and splashed it on his face. He wasn’t sure there was anything he could do to make his insides less of a mess, but the least he could do was not look the part._ _

__He ripped out his rubber band, grimacing as he tried to run his fingers through some of the knots in the longer bits in the back before sighing and giving up, shoving it back up in a messy ponytail. There was only so much he could do in a dingy gas station bathroom._ _

__Five minutes later, only somewhat satisfied with his appearance, he finally emerged to find Shiro sitting on the curb beside the front doors, attempting to open a candy bag and cursing to himself._ _

__“Need some help?” Keith laughed, unable to hide his amusement as Shiro’s giant hands struggled with the small bag of candy._ _

__Shiro’s head shot up in surprise and he blushed slightly but held it out for Keith. “I don’t know why I can never get the freaking bags open.”_ _

__Keith snorted, quirking an eyebrow as Shiro passed him the bag of orange slices. He pinched the bag between his fingers, pulling it apart easily before passing it back to Shiro._ _

__“Ah, my hero,” Shiro said, reaching in picking up an orange slice. “How many times you gonna rescue me today, red?”_ _

__“Oh I dunno,” Keith said, pretending to think hard as he dropped down onto the curb beside Shiro, “as many times as it takes.”_ _

__“My hero,” Shiro said with a dramatic flourish, gifting Keith a wink before taking a bite of his candy._ _

__Keith watched him chew and felt some of his previous unease slowly fade away as he realized that it was damn near impossible not to feel relaxed around Shiro, which was reason enough for Keith to be worried. He shouldn’t find it so easy to be around someone he didn’t really know, especially someone he had a crush on. Normally either of those things was enough to send Keith running in the opposite direction. Except being around Shiro hadn’t felt awkward or uncomfortable at all, not even once. The only time Keith had truly felt unsettled had been alone in that bathroom, stuck with nothing but his own thoughts._ _

__“I uh...I hope it’s not weird but I bought you something,” Shiro said once he’d swallowed his candy. Keith’s head turned in surprise as Shiro reached into his hoodie pocket and pulled out a bag of red licorice. “Unfortunately they don’t sell anything here that could come close to serving as a good enough thank you for helping me out, but I saw these and,” he paused, blowing the hair out of his eyes before sitting up straighter and holding the candy out towards Keith, “I thought of you. You know, because it’s red.”_ _

__Shiro seemed to realize how ridiculously cheesy his last sentence was because as soon as Keith took the licorice he grabbed two orange slices out of his own bag and shoved them both in his mouth in what Keith could only assume was a means to make himself unable to speak._ _

__Keith looked down at the licorice in his hand, trying to remember the last time someone had bought him something. Lance had got him a new helmet for his birthday last year because he’d known Keith had needed one, and Mrs. Mcclain had given him a AAA membership insisting she’d feel safer if he had it when he drove. So it wasn’t as if he didn't get gifts. But something small like this, just because someone had thought of him? That was something else entirely._ _

__That was something Keith didn’t have words for. Something that made his body flush with warmth despite the chill in the air._ _

__“My name is Keith,” he said quietly, ripping open the corner of the package and pulling out a single piece of licorice._ _

__“Keith,” Shiro repeated softly, as if testing the name on his tongue._ _

__“You have a sweet tooth then?” Keith asked, even though he knew the answer already from watching him._ _

__Shiro nodded. “Yeah, I try to eat pretty healthy most of the time. But I can’t resist the lure of candy. Gummy candy in particular. I know most people hate these but I love them. It’s like sugar coated sugar.”_ _

__“I mean you are only six, makes sense,” Keith teased, not realizing the implications of what he was saying._ _

__Shiro had another orange slice halfway to his mouth when he got an impish look on his face. “Oh my god, you watch my channel.”_ _

__Keith realized what he’d said, giving away that he knew Shiro was a leap year baby and most definitely had seen more than just a few episodes and wondered if it was possible to die from embarrassment. Head spread from his face down his neck, his ears ringing as he shoved the entire piece of licorice into his mouth and shrugged noncommittally._ _

__“Your name isn’t secretly Lance is it?” Shiro asked, looking rather pleased with himself. H_ _

__Keith flipped him off earning him a bark of laughter from Shiro._ _

__“Do you uh….do you like it?” Shiro asked, voice taking on an uneven pitch. There was something indiscernible in his voice, and Keith wished he knew what it meant._ _

___I like you_ he wanted to answer as if that could come close to encapsulating the way he felt about the other man. He thought of all the things he wished he could say right then. _I like the sound of your voice. I like the way you look in that ridiculous sweatshirt. I like your positivity. I like that you’re incredibly capable but somehow still a little bit helpless. I like that you’re as funny and real in person as I’d hoped you might be. I like the the way you smile. I like the way you can make me smile. I like even more in person than I thought possible and it's terrifying.__ _

__“It’s above average,” Keith answered once he’d swallowed his licorice, staring at the hole in his jeans at his knee—the weight of Shiro’s gaze was tangible._ _

__“So what you’re saying is you’ve seen a lot of my videos and you probably already know anything I could tell you.”_ _

__“Oh, I dunno,” Keith answered, “there’s knowing things about someone and _knowing_ them.”_ _

__“That’s true,” Shiro agreed. “Thanks for uh, you know, not assuming you know everything about me. It’s nice. People do it a lot and I get it, but...it’s nice to just be Shiro you know?”_ _

__Keith opened his mouth to respond but a gust of wind blew by, causing him to shiver involuntarily._ _

__“You’re cold,” Shiro blurted out, and before Keith could answer Shiro was reaching behind his head and tugging off his sweatshirt. He held it out to Keith expectantly._ _

__Keith opened his mouth to say no, that he couldn’t possibly take the other man’s hoodie. Instead what he found himself saying was, “Thank you.”_ _

__He laid the licorice down beside him, pulling the sweatshirt on and barely resisting the urge to close his eyes and inhale. The sweatshirt was impossibly warm and had the lingering scent of some kind of musky body wash that made Keith’s stomach and dick each take notice. It smelled like _Shiro_ and he reality of having his pseudo famous crush’s sweatshirt on his own body—one still radiating heat from the other man’s body—left Keith feeling dizzy. This could not be real. Things like this did not happen, especially not to Keith._ _

__Keith rolled the cuffs up, the sweatshirt a good two sizes too big on him, ignoring the uncomfortable flutter of nerves welling up inside of him as he tried to remind himself that Shiro was just a nice guy._ _

__“Better?” Shiro asked, leaning his elbows on his knees._ _

__“Yeah, much, but now you’ll be cold,” Keith said, noticing for the first time what Shiro was wearing underneath his hoodie—a grey t-shirt covered in happy little planets that read _In my Day we had nine planets._ The material stretched tightly across his broad chest, his biceps on full display. God he was such a fucking nerd, and Keith was so gone for it._ _

__“I’ll be fine,” Shiro answered, seemingly unawares of Keith ogling him. “I run pretty hot anyway. I just like sweatshirts. They’re comfortable. I don’t really need it. Besides it's the least I can do for my very own hero.”_ _

__“I mean you saved me from the cold and bought me candy, i think we’re pretty much even at this point,” Keith said with a smile. “Speaking of, if I’m going to save you we really should get back and put that gas in your car and make sure that’s all it is. I mean, I’m like ninety nine percent sure that's the only problem, but the fuel pump has to work harder when you’re low on gas so there’s a small possibility you did some damage letting it get that low.”_ _

__Shiro let out a low whistle, pocketing his bag of orange slices and rising to stand. He held a hand out to Keith who accepted it gratefully. The metal beneath his fingers was cold, but the warmth in Shiro’s eyes more than made up for it._ _

__“Right, let's do this then.”_ _

__Keith shoved his own candy in the front pocket of the hoodie, barely cognizant of what was happening as they both climbed onto the bike. This time instead of Shiro’s warm chest against his back there was nothing but a cold, hard gas can. Shiro somehow still managed to wrap both his arms around Keith’s waist as they sped back towards Shiro’s car._ _

__Fifteen minutes lately, the gas can full emptied into the car and Shiro deposited securely in the driver's seat, he finally put the key into the ignition and started the car. There was a loud chug followed immediately by the sound of the engine revving._ _

__“Yes,” Shiro cried out happily, slapping his hand on the steering wheel before he turning his eyes on Keith. “I can’t thank you enough. Seriously.”_ _

__“It’s nothing,” Keith said, shrugging his shoulders as he removed Shiro’s sweatshirt and passed it to him through the open window._ _

__“Thanks,” Shiro said, taking the hoodie and tossing it onto the seat beside him. “And it was definitely not nothing.”_ _

__“Anyone would’ve stopped to help,” Keith answered._ _

__“Well, if it could’ve been anyone then I’m glad it was you. It was really nice meeting you, Keith.”_ _

__Shiro smiled at him again, something soft and private that made Keith’s chest ache with desire for things he couldn’t have. Fuck, he needed to end this before he did something so embarrassing there was no coming back from it._ _

__“You too,” Keith answered. “You should drive off ahead of me, I’ll follow behind you until you get to the highway just to make sure everything is running okay.”_ _

__“Right,” Shiro said, his eyebrows furrowing in what Keith could only guess must have been some lingering embarrassment about running out of gas. Hoping to spare Shiro’s feelings, Keith walked backwards before the conversation had a chance to get awkward._ _

__“Bye, Shiro.”_ _

__Shiro pulled his Camaro onto the road and gave Keith one last wave as Keith mounted his bike, waiting for Keith to put on his helmet and give him the thumbs up. A half smile was the last thing he saw on Shiro’s face before his car was speeding down the road, the sleek black Camaro framed in a sea of moonlight._ _

__It wasn’t until an hour later once Keith had jerked off, showered, wanked again and was facedown in his bed ignoring the fifteenth text from Lance in the last ten minutes that it occurred to him he’d left his leather jacket in the back of Shiro’s car._ _

__Fuck._ _

__Keith groaned into his pillow._ _

__It wasn’t bad enough Shiro’d taken a bit of Keith’s heart with him, not he had his favorite jacket too._ _

__

__****_ _

**~~~~~~~**

Several days later Keith was no closer to coming to terms with his feelings or the loss of his jacket.

Liking Shiro before had been fine, if admittedly a little embarrassing, since Keith hated the idea that he was one of many who probably had the hots for Shiro. At the end of the day though, Keith felt safe enough hidden behind his own screen to admit that he had a thing for Shiro.

But that thing had been something separate from himself. Something Keith could ignore on a day-to-day basis because he didn’t know Shiro, and Shiro didn’t know him. There was nothing to ignore or get over, just a safe little crush that sometimes made Keith feel giddy.

Keith knew it was stupid. He’d known Shiro was a real person. Of course he was. But behind the safety of the screen, Shiro had been more fantasy than reality. Now Keith knew that the reality far surprised every single fantasy.

He knew exactly how tall he was, what he smelled like, and that nothing about Shiro was false. He was as funny and kind and open and dorky in person as he was on YouTube. And that realization, instead of being wonderful, was fucking horrifying, because it meant all the things Keith felt about Shiro were no longer attached to some fantasy man he never thought he’d meet.

They were _real_.

Keith’s feelings shifting into something more solid didn’t mean actually anything, because Shiro was still Shiro. He was still famous—at least in the world of online personalities—and still wildly out of Keith’s league. There was also a slim to no chance of Keith ever running into him again, which meant that it was absolutely in Keith’s best interest to ignore his feelings.

Unfortunately for him, his feelings were about as subtle as a drunk donkey stampeding across his heart, and Keith rarely did what was in his best interest.

“Wow, you look like shit,” Lance said the moment Keith walked in the front door on Monday afternoon. There were a few regulars in the far corner booths too absorbed in their laptops and coffee to pay Lance or Keith any mind.

Keith grimaced. He hadn’t bothered looking in the mirror that day and instead had rolled out of bed wearing the exact same clothes he’d slept in the last two nights. He also hadn’t showered since his run-in with Shiro, and the last solid food he’d consumed besides the rest of his red licorice was an entire box of pizza rolls he’d eaten at midnight before falling asleep on his sofa.

Keith flipped him off, pushing past Lance and ignoring his squawk of indignation.

“Alright, what the fuck happened?” Lance said, following behind him closely as Keith ducked behind the counter in search of his red hat and apron.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he lied, refusing to turn around. He knew that the second he did that Lance would find a way to weasel the truth out of him, and the last thing Keith needed after his weekend was to have an emotional heart to heart five minutes before the afternoon rush. For some godawful fucking reason, Keith was wholly incapable of keeping secrets from Lance, which was exactly why he’d ignored his fifty-two texts over the weekend and three phone calls that morning.

“You don’t know what I mean,” Lance intoned, his voice dripping with sarcasm as he shoved a bony finger straight into the middle of Keith’s back. “Yes, you do. You’re hiding something from me! Turn around and spill, mullet!”

It was on the tip of Keith’s tongue to say no when someone at the counter cleared their throat.

Lance’s apron strings whacked the back of Keith’s knee as he spun around to face the counter.

“Welcome to Castleship Coffee, what can I get you today?” Lance asked in a tone far more polite than he’d ever used with Keith. It never failed to amaze Keith how rapidly Lance could switch into his public service persona no matter what kind of mood he was in.

Keith sighed heavily as put on his hat, pulling his hair through the hole in the back and turning around just in time to see a large group of teenagers file in. Normally the afternoon rush was too much to handle, especially on Mondays once the nearby high school let out, but for once Keith felt grateful for the rush of drinks that would soon come his way. He was looking forward to focusing on the orders, well aware that and Lance could not grill him about his Houdini act over the weekend if he couldn’t get off the register.

Time became a blur as Keith made drink after drink, leaving him with no time to wallow in his own thoughts or worry about Lance. He was so in the groove of making drinks it took him a few seconds to realize after passing off the last cappuccino that there was no longer a stack of cups beside him waiting to be made. He turned his head just in time see Lance inching towards him with a shit-eating grin on his face.

“So,” Lance chirped, dragging out the last syllable, “how was your weekend? Travel to outer space? Stay home and wank all weekend? Maybe you finally decided to build that model spaceship you got for Christmas last year then cried when you realized it wouldn’t actually take you to the moon?”

“You’re so ridiculous,” Keith snorted.

“Ho ho ho, listen here, buddy. If either of us is ridiculous it is you, the person who ignored all forms of attempted communication from me for fifty-six hours. I even tried to call you instead of text and you ignored me. What happened to our bro code? I could have been dying!”

“But were you?” Keith asked, a sudden wave of guilt hitting him. It’d never occurred to him Lance might have needed _him_.

Lance frowned. “Obviously not, I’m right here. Seriously, though, what’s going on? The last time you pulled a stunt like this was when we were fourteen and you didn’t show up to our sleepover and then ignored all of my hilarious jokes I texted you all weekend because you were having a crisis about realizing you were gay. Oh my god, are you pregnant? Did you run away to Las Vegas and get married? Did you find out you were half alien?”

“No,” Keith answered, crossing his arms over his chest and fighting down the truth that was already threatening to spill out. It was always like that with Lance. He had a way of making everything seem so completely ridiculous and dramatic that somehow the truth became even easier than a lie.

“Right, well, the world didn’t end when you told me you were gay, or when you had that godawful phase in high school where you had a crush on the douchey straight quarterback—”

“I didn’t have a crush on him,” Keith interrupted, recalling with horror the three months during which Keith’s every wet dream had revolved around a pair of thick thighs and muscular hands. A fact that still haunted him to this day since Griffin had been the world’s largest asshole.

Lance completely ignored him.

“And it didn’t end when you dropped out of college or when you admitted that you were still a virgin because you were saving your first time for true love like some sort of Disney princess. So just spit the truth out, let me make fun of you, and we can get back to our daily lives.”

Keith groaned. “You won’t believe me.”

Lance’s eyes lit up as he did a quick double take of the front area to make sure there were no customers before completely invading Keith’s personal space. “Try me.”

Keith inhaled once, blowing it out slowly before lifting his eyes to Lance’s. “So I, uh...met Shiro on the way home from your house on Saturday night.”

Lance blinked. “I’m sorry I think I temporarily lost my hearing. You _what_?”

“Shiro. I met him.”

Lance’s hands flew out to grab ahold of Keith’s shoulders in a grip just the other side of painful, shaking him hard as he spoke. “Shiro the YouTube celebrity Shiro? The guy you’ve been mooning over for a year? That Shiro?”

Keith nodded, trying to push Lance’s hands off his shoulders to no avail.

“Shiro, the man with the golden smile and the body made of bronze?”

“Oh my god, you watched more videos,” Keith laughed, recalling one video from last month where Shiro had read people’s comments on air, one of the most memorable being the exact phrasing Lance had just used.

Lance dropped his hands and crossed his arms over his chest defensively. “It was for research. Besides, that’s not the point.”

“The point is I met him and it’s done and I won’t ever see him again so there’s nothing to tell.”

“Please tell me you weren’t this grumpy when you met him? How did you meet him? Is he as handsome in person as he is on screen? How tall is he? On a scale from one to ten, how much of an ass did you make of yourself?”

“Why are you so sure I made an ass of myself?” Keith grumbled.

“Because you’re you.”

Keith resisted the urge to flip him off in case any customers were watching. “I might have possibly implied he was useless with cars and told him his YouTube channel was just above average.”

“Oh my god,” Lance groaned, clapping a hand to his forehead dramatically. “You’re such a fucking disaster. You’re supposed to compliment people you like not...whatever the fuck that is.”

“It’s not like I expected to see him on the side of the road broken down!”

“Oh my god, you rescued him?” Lance all but yelled, looking far too excited. “Was he injured? Were you his prince charming? Tell me everything.”

“It wasn’t like that,” Keith objected, thinking of Shiro’s _how many times you gonna save me_. “He was broken down on that old trucker road at the edge of town. Or well...not exactly broken down. He ran out of gas. I’m telling you the story isn’t that exciting. I gave him a ride to the gas station, he bought me some candy, and then I took him back to his car. End of story.”

“End of story. _End of story?”_ Lance cried, voice going shrill. “First of all, we are going to have some serious words later about you letting him on your motorcycle when you still haven’t let _me_ have a ride. My feelings are deeply and irrevocably hurt and I foresee you buying me a very expensive burger and fry combo on Friday to make it up to me. Probably a strawberry shake too. Second of all, why did he buy you candy? And third of all, please tell me you got his phone number?”

“I dunno, he bought me licorice because he said it was red and reminded him of me while I was in the bathroom.” Lance shot him an incredulous look that Keith pretended not to notice. “Look, he was just trying to be nice because he was embarrassed about running out of gas. It meant nothing.”

“You’re so obtuse it’s physically painful for me. People don’t buy other people candy and tell them sweet things because they’re being friendly. If he was just being nice he would’ve said thank you or slipped you a twenty to cover your gas. Also, why the hell were you wearing his sweatshirt? My god, it’s like pulling teeth to get a full story out of you. It doesn’t mean anything, you say, only to slowly give me breadcrumbs about sweet nothings murmured in the moonlight as you two shared your life stories in an empty gas station and fell in love. It’s exactly like one of those romance movies that you claim to hate but I know you watch when you’re sick. Did you tell him you love him? Was there a kiss? And you didn’t answer me, did you get his number?”

Keith groaned, burying his face in his hands.

“Of course I didn’t ask for his phone number. It wasn’t some romantic midnight rendezvous or whatever the hell it is you’re imagining in that weird brain of yours. He was desperate and being nice so I’d help him. Besides, he wasn’t into me like that, so asking for it would have made me come across as some creepy fanboy. I didn’t even remember to get my leather jacket out of the back of his car once I gave him his sweatshirt back.”

Lance made a sound like a dying whale, falling back against the counter and sending a stack of unused paper cups careening to the floor as he clutched at his chest. “You. Shared. Clothes?”

“It wasn’t a big deal,” Keith insisted, bending down to restacking the cups. If he closed his eyes and focused hard enough, he could almost smell Shiro’s body wash, could almost feel the warmth of that soft, worn cotton hoodie against his skin again.

“You’re such an awful liar,” Lance said, squatting down to help him. “Come on, just tell me the truth. What was he like?”

Keith paused, glancing up at Lance from beneath the edge of his hat. It wasn’t like he would ever see Shiro again. It couldn’t hurt to tell Lance the truth, could it?

“He was amazing,” Keith answered quietly.

“Yes,” Lance whooped. “I knew it! Come on, buddy, you’re killing me. You’ve gotta give me more than that. What was he really like?”

Keith stood up, plopping the cups back on the counter.

“Shiro was...exactly like he seems. He’s funny and almost nice, and really, really hot.”

“I knew it. I knew someone like that couldn’t be fake,” Lance said.

“Now who’s the liar? You just just told me there was no way someone like him was real. In fact, I believe your exact words were, _‘Shiro is probably as fake as the—_ ”

Lance jumped forward, covering Keith’s mouth with his hand., “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Keith narrowed his eyes and aimed a finger jab directly in the center of Lance’s stomach. Lance gasped in surprise, withdrawing his hand from Keith’s mouth and frowning at him. “You’re so mean.”

Keith rolled his eyes, prepared to tell Lance exactly what he thought of him when the bell above the front door jingled. “Customers,” he hissed.

Lance’s entire demeanor changed and he stood taller as he turned and watched the group of elderly ladies all dressed in purple with red hats amble slowly to the counter and spared Keith one last serious look as he shuffled his feet backward towards the register. “Later,” he mouthed, which would have been more ominous if he hadn’t turned to the old women two seconds later and adopted the most sickly sweet voice alive as he said, “Ladies, I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask for some identification. You don’t look old enough to be here alone.”

The women smiled, their eyes lighting up as they looked at Lance as if he were _charming_. The oldest-looking one in the front moved to stand at the register. “You angling for a tip, young man?”

“Just giving the most beautiful customers of the day the impeccable service they deserve. Can I interest any of you in our freshly brewed decaf coffee? Or perhaps one of our muffins. Today’s is honey bran with raisins.”

He leaned against the counter and winked. Keith wasn’t sure if he was more horrified or impressed when the old woman actually giggled as she plopped her large purse on the counter and said, “Three decaf senior coffees and three muffins.”

“You want sugar and cream in those, ma’am, or are you lovely ladies sweet enough as it is?”

 _Horrified_ , Keith thought. Definitely horrified.

The old woman giggled. “Cream and sugar, dear. And you know what, why don’t you make those coffees regulars instead of decaf.”

“Living on the wild side today. I like it,” he said, tipping his hat and giving the woman the cheesiest wink in history. She smiled, digging around in her purse until she found her wallet and pulled out a crispy fifty-dollar bill.

“Keep the change, young man,” she told him.

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you. I’ll bring that order to you lovely ladies in just a minute.”

Keith’s mouth was still hanging wide open when Lance turned to smile at him, making finger guns in the air and winking. Along with horrified Keith had to admit he was also a tiny bit impressed with Lance’s ability to charm people. Not that he would ever tell Lance that.

Despite Lance’s promise to make Keith talk about things more later, Keith somehow managed to avoid the conversation completely. Between the late afternoon rush that lasted well through his missed dinner break, Allura’s perfectly timed visit close to closing, and cleaning down the machines, he eventually escaped work and got back to his apartment without having to confess that meeting Shiro had magnified his crush instead of diminished it. Once home he’d inhaled a cup-of-soup so fast he burned the roof of his mouth, taken an ice-cold shower that had done nothing to dampen his unwanted arousal, and then crashed face first into his bed exhausted.

A dulled buzzing noise broke through the fog of Keith’s brain as he groaned, shoving his face into his pillow. The buzzing continued, loud enough Keith couldn’t ignore it, and he grudgingly rolled over and sat up in search of his phone that he had apparently forgotten to silence before he’d fallen asleep.

One look at the glowing red lights of the clock on his bedside table showed him that it was twenty-six minutes after midnight. Keith flung an arm out, blearily reaching for his phone but it was nowhere to be seen on the bedside table. By the time he found it a few minutes later wedged in between the head of his mattress and the wall the buzzing had stopped. He swiped open his phone and squinted down at the list of notifications.

_39 text messages - Lance. 2 missed phone calls - Lance_

He jabbed the call back button with more force than necessary, dread pooling in the pit of his stomach. The phone barely got out one full ring before Lance answered.

“Fucking about time you answered!”

“Shit, what’s wrong? Is it one of the kids? Your mom?” Keith asked.

“What? No, everyone is fine. Why do you always assume someone is in the hospital or died?” Lance sighed.

“Because it’s the middle of the night, asshole.”

“Oh, fair point,” Lance chirped, clearly not half asleep like Keith was. “Have you watched Shiro’s channel in the last half hour?”

Keith scrubbed a hand over his face. “No, I was _sleeping._ ”

“You need to watch it. Now. He uploaded a video at exactly midnight.”

Keith blinked, the crackle of static loud in his ear as he wondered if he were possible still dreaming. “Why were you watching Shiro’s channel in the middle of the night?”

Lance groaned loudly. “Why are you like this? You are focusing on the wrong thing. Just do it!”

“Fine,” Keith grumbled, knowing there was no other way to shut Lance up. That and Keith’s own curiosity was piqued. In all the time he’d been following Shiro on YouTube and Instagram his posting schedule had always been predictable. He never posted videos in off hours, and he never posted random videos that didn’t fit within his theme. He couldn’t imagine the other man uploading something at midnight on a Monday night.

“Hurry up,” Lance barked.

“Fuck you,” Keith said, flipping him off even though he couldn’t see him. It made him feel better anyhow as he threw back his blankets and shuffled over to his desk in the corner. He put the phone on speaker and dropped it onto the desk before opening his laptop and typing in his password.

“You’re slow as a turtle today,” Lance said.

“I’m half asleep,” Keith grumbled, opening his internet browser and clicking on his bookmarked pages. Shiro’s page popped open immediately, and he scrolled down to find most recently uploaded videos.

“Did you find it yet, huh? Did you? Did you?” Lance asked.

“Fuck, how many espressos did you have while we were closing up?” Keith asked.

“None of your business, now do you see—”

“What the fuck?” Keith blurted out.

Lance let out an obscene holler. “Click on it, my man! Oh my god, this is going to be amazing. If at any point you need me to call 911 or drive straight to your apartment for emotional support just let me know, okay?”

Keith blinked twice, rubbing his hands over his eyes and leaning his face towards the screen as he took in the video preview that was of Shiro looking bashful and holding up Keith’s missing jacket. Below it was the video title: _Help Me Find My Cinderfella_

Lance was still chattering a mile a minute, but Keith had completely stopped listening to him as he turned up the volume before clicking play.

“Hey guys,” Shiro’s soothing voice said through Keith’s laptop. Unlike Shiro’s usual videos this one was immediately recognizable as different. There was no perfect lighting, and he appeared to be sitting in the middle of his bed. His cat was curled up in his lap and his hair was a mess. In fact it looked exactly the same as it had when he’d pulled Keith’s helmet off his head a few nights ago—sticking up in the back and the front flying in every direction. “I know this might seem a little crazy but if I’ve realized anything in the last forty-eight hours it’s that some things in life are just that. We only get one life and sometimes it’s hard and messy and confusing and things don’t work out perfect. Sometimes we just have to...take a chance on something that terrifies us even if we know it might end poorly. We have to try.”

Shiro paused, looking down at his lap and scratching his cat behind the ears before he turned his eyes back on the camera, and Keith had the irrational feeling that Shiro was looking straight through the screen at him.

“I guess I should start at the beginning so you guys aren’t sitting there completely confused. Saturday night I took my new car Atlas out for our first drive to go stargazing, and like the complete genius that I am, I somehow managed to run out of gas on the side of a deserted road. I was stuck there for over an hour before some guy on a motorcycle pulled over to help me. Instead of something from a horror movie I felt like maybe I’d bumped my head and woken up in an alternative universe because this guy couldn’t be real. He pulled off his helmet and I think I forgot how to breathe. He was _beautiful_ —eyes that looking like they were made of starlight, dark hair, and a smile that someone would die for. He wasn’t just good looking, though. He was decent and funny and honest and...special. He was special.”

Here Shiro paused, the silence near deafening as he blew out a breath and stroked his large hand over the cat's back as if gathering his courage. When he lifted his eyes to the camera again, there was a vulnerability there that Keith had never seen—something raw and unguarded.

“I was too nervous to ask for his phone number, and I’ve regretted it every second since. I know it’s crazy but I can’t help feeling like...like I was supposed to meet him. All I know is that his name is Keith, he drives a cherry-red motorcycle, and he left his jacket in my car.” Here Shiro lifted up Keith’s jacket and held it out for the camera before laying it back on his unmade bed. “I know this is a long shot and maybe it’s a little bit crazy, but he told me his best friend was one of my biggest fans, so Lance if you’re watching this video and I really hope you are, could you please help me find my Cinderfella. He left his jacket and took a piece of my heart with him.”

Shiro pulled his bottom lip into his mouth and smiled shyly at the camera for several seconds before the video ended. Keith felt entirely immobilized. This could not possibly be happening. Shiro wasn’t seriously talking about _him_ being gorgeous and special and someone he had to see again. Things like that didn’t happen in real life, especially not to someone as boring as Keith.

“He told me his best friend Lance was a big fan of mine,” Lance mimicked in a high-pitched voice.

Keith startled, having completely forgotten Lance was still on speakerphone.

“Uhhhh,” Keith started, unable to make his mouth form words. He’d rather hoped Lance would never find out about that.

“You threw me under the bus! I cannot believe you told him I was one of his biggest fans. You big fat lying asshole.”

“I mean, you were watching his channel at midnight,” Keith said, his brain still unable to come to terms with what he’d just seen.

Lance groaned loudly, and Keith could imagine the way he was probably pulling on his hair. “Focusing on the wrong thing. Again. You are so fucking hopeless. Keith, he likes you! Like he really likes you. As in he made an impromptu barely edited video and posted it at midnight because he can’t stop thinking about you kind of likes you. Why aren’t you freaking out? Are you freaking out? Should I come over and be your emotional support?”

Keith swallowed, unsure why he wasn’t freaking out. He was pretty sure he probably should be freaking out. Most people would in his position. A normal person would be over the moon to find out their hot, rich, incredible crush wanted to see them again.

Of course Keith wasn’t normal. Never had been. Which was exactly the crux of the problem.

“Earth to Keith. Did you faint? Should I call 911 so we can get you all patched up with a clean bill of health before we contact Shiro.”

“No,” Keith answered.

“No, you don’t want me to call 911? No, you’re not freaking out? You’re gonna have to give me a little more than one-word answers, buddy. I know I’m a lot of things but sadly mind reader is not one of them.”

“No, I don’t need you to come over and no I’m not freaking out because…because I’m not going to contact Shiro.”

This time the line was nothing but dead air.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhh, the end is here!!!

It’d been almost a week since Shiro’s video confession. 

Almost a week of Keith telling Lance in no uncertain terms that he was absolutely positive he’d made the right decision not to contact Shiro while secretly re-watching the video over and over every single chance he got. Once he’d almost dropped his phone in the toilet when he’d snuck it out during a five-minute break only to have Lance bang on the employee restroom and ask if he was jerking one off instead of taking a piss. 

Nearly a week of torturing himself by making the mistake of scrolling through the hundreds of comments which ranged from _omg what a lucky guy_ to _I’ll be your Cinderfella if you let me ;)_ or _You’re amazing Shiro, I hope he deserves you!_. Keith, clearly a glutton for punishment, continued to check the comments daily and as the days went on the comments got bolder, begging for updates or insisting that whomever it was probably didn’t deserve Shiro anyway if they still hadn’t contacted him.

Tuesday morning, Shiro uploaded a new Microwave Monday video a day late but the smile he gave the camera didn’t reach his eyes. There was something different, and it’d left a tangible ache in Keith’s chest. He had been grateful to have that day off work since he’d spent the entire day feeling unexpectedly out of sorts and unable to focus. Instead of feeling confident in his decision, Keith felt twisted up in confusion.

Wednesday and Thursday there were no new video from Shiro, which should have made it easier for Keith to go about his normal life. Instead, he spent four hours in bed on Thursday staring at the ceiling, was fifteen minutes late for work, and managed to make more drinks wrong than on his first day when he’d still been in training. Thursday had been much the same, and he’d messed up so many orders Lance had called Pidge to cover his shift and he’d sent Keith to sit in the corner of the coffee shop nursing an over-sized hot chocolate and a stack of sugar cookies. Keith secretly suspected Lance was trying to give him a stomachache to match his heartache, but since he was of the solemn opinion he deserved both he bore it all in silence.

Friday Shiro uploaded a short Positivity Popcorn video, urging his viewers to never give up even when things didn’t go their way. He didn’t mention his impromptu midnight upload, but the meaning was there loud and clear when he said, _Sometimes things hurt, but we’re more human for going after the things we want. Be strong. Be brave. Be You._

It’d taken Keith a long time to get out of bed after watching that one. Long enough that he was nearly an hour late for work. Lance had given him a knowing look when he’d stumbled through the back door but for once hadn’t given him any shit about it. Even Pidge—who usually hated working overtime—had been surprisingly tight-lipped about being required to cover for him. The most she’d done had been to pat him on the back and give him a pathetic look as she left. Keith had expected to get ripped a new once the lull in customers came, but instead Lance had merely talked a mile a minute about his date with Allura the night before and how many points he’d managed to rack up in Paladins of Voltron.

The lack of teasing had somehow been even worse than if Lance had screamed _I told you so_ or berated him for being irresponsible and late. By the time his shift ended he’d almost wished Lance would’ve asked him at least once if he was sure about not getting in touch with Shiro for the millionth time, or made Keith explain again why it was better off this way. It was a conversation they’d had the last four days in a row, and every time Lance pointed out how much Shiro seemed to like him, or how much Keith liked Shiro in return, Keith would shut him down. 

Lance had apparently gotten tired of Keith’s refusal to discuss things and chosen to drop it, and while Keith should’ve been happy, instead all he felt was hollow. He didn’t know how to explain, even to Lance, that he was terrified. How did you explain to someone who seemed to think they were a gift to humanity that you were sure you would only turn out to be a disappointment? Keith knew enough about Shiro to be absolutely sure that Shiro was exactly his type—built like a brick house with a smile like a boy scout, as into nerdy stuff like stargazing and video games as he was working out, and with a heart of gold. 

Keith wasn’t entirely sure what kind of person Shiro thought he was, but he felt pretty confident that his reality wouldn’t live up to whatever idealized image Shiro had created of him. Keith had rarely been scared of anything in his life. The one thing he was afraid of was rejection, and Shiro couldn’t reject him if Keith never gave him the chance.

When push came to shove he knew that he was being a bit of a chickenshit about the entire thing. Problem was, he didn’t know what to do about it. He’d made a decision and now he was sticking with it, even if he was having second thoughts about his choice. 

A loud ringing started Keith from his thoughts and he groaned, rolling over and shoving his face into his pillow. Unfortunately the ringing did not abate, and once the first cycle of rings stopped, it started again. There was only one person Keith knew who called and called until the other person answered. Lance.

With an audible sigh Keith flung an arm out and grabbed his phone from the corner of his bed, lifting his face from the pillow and clicking answer.

“Oh my god, it’s about time. Please don’t tell me you’re still in bed.”

“I’m not sleeping,” Keith answered.

There was a short pause before Lance clicked his tongue. “You haven’t got out of bed today, have you?”

“I got up to piss,” Keith said, leaving out the part about how he’d put it off so long he’d barely made it to the bathroom and then proceeded to fall face first into the bed after which is the position he’d been stuck in for the last forty minutes.

“My god, how would you even survive without me. You are so lucky I’m your best friend and I love you and I’m obviously so much more well-adjusted than you so that I help you be less of a disaster. Get up, take a shower, and get your ass down here in the next half hour.”

“I’m not working today, why the fuck would I come in?” Keith asked, but there was a smile tugging at the corner of his lips at Lance’s easy declaration. He was glad Lance couldn’t see it or he might never hear the end of it. Keith could recall with perfect clarity how terrified he’d been coming out to him a few short years ago, afraid it might change things between them. Lance had taken it in stride like he did all things, assuring Keith he wouldn’t hold it against him if he fell in love with him one day like most people were doomed to do but letting Keith know in no uncertain terms that it could never mean anything since he saw Keith like a brother and always would. Then he’d tackled Keith to the floor and tried to make him smell his armpit, and that had been that.

“Let’s set the scene, shall we? You’re sitting in bed where you’ve been long enough there’s probably a hole in your mattress. Your sheets haven’t been washed in two weeks. You probably smell like an alley cat, there’s at least two half-full soda cans next to your bed along with a Snickers wrapper, and you’re wallowing like the emo boy you are. Am I right?”

“Fuck you,” Keith grumbled, pulling his knees to his chest and dropping his chin to his knees. Lance was right, which was the problem with being best friends with someone who had known you since you still wet the bed and didn’t have your two front teeth. They were there for every embarrassing mistake you made growing up and knew you better than you knew yourself sometimes, which meant they could use that knowledge against you.

“Ha, I knew it,” Lance exclaimed, apparently taking that as confirmation. “So that means you definitely have nothing better to do today, which means you’re going to come down to the coffee shop. I’ll even buy you a muffin. Hunk made the cinnamon and sugar ones with a crumble topping that you love so much.”

Keith hesitated. Lance was playing dirty. Those were his absolute favorite muffins and didn’t usually make it onto the seasonal muffin menu until autumn. Keith had no idea what Lance had done to get Hunk to make them in March. Hunk hated changing his schedule, which meant that Lance definitely had an ulterior motive for trying to get Keith down there. There was a good chance it would involve socialization or talking about his feelings, neither of which he felt up to today. On the other hand, he really was starting to smell and he could practically taste one of Hunk’s freshly baked muffins already.

“Fine, I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“Thirty, dude. This is not an ass and pits kind of shower day. Just...wash your hair.”

Keith frowned, afraid to even try to imagine why the hell Lance cared if he washed his hair. “Why? What do you have planned?”

“Just trust me, my dude. Half an hour.” Not bothering to give Keith a chance to argue, Lance hung up.

 _What the fuck_ , Keith thought, kicking off his blanket and throwing his legs over the side of the bed. _What was the worst that could happen?_

By the time Keith had showered—including washing and towel drying his hair—found a respectably clean t-shirt on the floor of his closet and managed to drive himself down to Castleship Coffees he was actually beginning to feel better. The shower had succeeded in making him feel less like the trash someone forgot to throw out, and the first bit of fresh air he’d had in thirty-six hours was surprisingly needed. In fact, Keith was almost in a good mood by the time he pulled his motorcycle into the employee lot behind the coffee shop.

The second he was slipping inside, his mood lifted even further. It was just this side of too warm—something Keith favored having grown up in the Southwest—and the smell of baked goods and freshly brewing coffee assaulted his nose. There was low rumble of chatter, every table packed to the brim like usual on a Saturday afternoon, but for once Keith wasn’t responsible for serving them.

He rarely ever came into work if he wasn’t on the clock, convinced he saw enough of the place as it was working there forty hours a week. Except he couldn’t deny that in that moment the lure of being a customer and demanding Lance serve him was as enticing as the aroma of the food he knew he was about to consume.

“Boo,” Keith hissed, tapping Pidge on the shoulder before hopping to her other side. Pidge nearly jumped out of her skin, spilling the espresso drink she was crafting and shooting Keith a dirty look.

“Jesus, a little warning,” Pidge grumbled, steadying her hand as she pulled another shot.

“Hello to you too,” Keith said, leaning back against the counter.

“You came!” Lance shouted, looking even more pleased to see Keith than usual. There was an unnaturally wide smile spread across his face and he was shooting Keith two thumbs up as he waited for his customer’s credit card payment to go through.

Keith was immediately on the defensive.

“Does he look a little manic to you?” Keith asked, leaning close enough to Pidge that there was no chance Lance could attempt to read his lips.

“You mean more than usual?” Pidge asked before flipping on the foamer. Keith waited until she’d finished so he didn't have to yell.

“Yes,” he said once she finished, crossing his arms over his chest after the third time Lance turned to smile at him. It was making the hairs at the back of his neck stand up.

“I hadn’t noticed,” Pidge said as she poured the milk into the cup. It didn’t escape Keith’s notice that Pidge was attempting—and failing—to hide a smile. A sure sign she was lying.

“What’s going on?” Keith asked, poking her in the arm. “Come on and tell me. You know you want to.”

“Hey, there you are,” Lance said, wedging himself in the small space between Keith and Pidge and effectively ruining any hope Keith had of asking her anything else.

“Don’t you have customers to bother?”

“As you can clearly see, there are absolutely no customers in line at this moment, leaving me free to come and visit with my best friend in the entire world. How are you? Sleep well? You look particularly handsome today.”

Keith narrowed his eyes at Lance. “Why are you being so nice?”

Pidge laughed, covering it up with a cough that earned her an elbow from Lance before he turned an unnaturally large smile on Keith once again. “I’m always nice. I know that’s confusing for someone as cranky as you to understand.”

“There’s the Lance I know,” Keith laughed.

Lance opened his mouth at the same moment his phone buzzed causing an almost comical reaction as Lance stumbled backwards into Pidge, plunging his hand into his pocket and pulling out his phone.

“Fuck. Shit.” His eyes scanned over the phone as he hastily typed in a message and shoved the phone back in his pocket.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Lance said, flinging his arms out to grab Keith’s shoulders and shove him backward. “I need you to go into the back storeroom and find me that last case of single-source Ethiopian dark roast coffee. You know the one I mean. The one that’s so dark it tastes like burnt wood chips, and no one likes it. One of my regulars will be coming in soon and I completely forgot to bring it out. He’ll have a fit if he doesn’t get it.”

“Now? I’m not even on the clock!” Keith protested.

“Now!” Lance insisted, turning him around and shoving him forward. “Don’t come back out until you find it.”

“What about my muffin? I want my muffin,” Keith said in a voice that was closer to a whine than he was comfortable with, his feet shuffling towards the back room as slowly as possible.

“Just go. I’ll buy you two muffins instead of one.”

Keith grumbled under his breath but complied, sparing one last glance over his shoulder to see Pidge’s shoulders shaking in silent laughter and Lance shooting him more thumbs up. Fucking weirdos. 

He should’ve known coming in would mean someone would find a way to make him work. He knew better than to argue with Lance when he was at work. Lance always got on a power trip when he was on the clock as if being the person in charge of customer service meant he was in charge of everyone else, especially Keith. Besides, Lance’s smiling was beginning to unnerve him, and no matter how much he protested, Keith always liked being asked to go search for some obscure coffee or extra cups in the back. It was quiet and devoid of people, and he liked the small respite from the bright and bustling coffee shop.

It took Keith a lot longer than he thought it would to find the coffee, which for some reason had been shelved behind their large stock of specialty teas. If Keith hadn’t known that it was Pidge and not Lance who was in charge or reorganizing the back stock he would’ve thought Lance had hidden it on purpose, though he couldn’t even begin to guess why.

By the time he finally reemerged carrying one of the bags of apparently coveted coffee, the mid-afternoon rush had picked up again. Keith meandered over to Pidge, dropping the coffee down on the empty counter space near the espresso maker. 

“His regular get here yet?” Keith asked.

“What regular?” Pidge queried, not even looking up from the drink she was making.

“The regular who apparently enjoys drinking sludge. The reason I just spent the last twenty minutes digging through the backroom to find the coffee no one ever wants.”

Pidge turned big eyes on Keith. “Oh that guy. Uh no, he must be late.”

“Right, well I want my muffins,” Keith said, leaning sideways to try and see how many of them were left in the bakery display. 

“Here, I need you to make this coffee,” Pidge shouted, shoving a cup directly towards Keith’s chest.

Keith’s fingers automatically curled around the paper cup as he eyed Pidge. “Why?”

“I uh, gotta pee. Yeah, that’s it. I need to pee. You know how it is. I couldn’t possibly wait for my break to go, and as you can see Lance is far too busy to cover me so that only leaves you. I uh...might be a few minutes,” she mumbled, practically running away.

Keith rolled his eyes but immediately moved to fill Pidge’s spot in front of the espresso machine as he turned the cup to read the order. _Large caramel macchiato, extra caramel sauce, add two shots of hazelnut syrup, add whip, add chocolate drizzle._

“Jesus fucking christ,” Keith muttered to himself, his stomach turning at the thought of one person consuming such a sickeningly sweet drink. How in the fuck did anyone drink things like this? He’d seen some sweet drinks in his time, but this one took the cake. He felt his blood sugar rise just reading the cup once more before he packed the espresso, foamed the milk, and added whipped cream. He didn’t even bother hiding a grimace as he drizzled even more caramel and chocolate sauce on the top.

It wasn’t until he was popping on the lid and preparing to set it on the small order counter that it occurred to him there was no name on the cup. He turned to ask Lance but found him deep in conversation with his current customer about the difference between a flat white and latte. 

He turned it around once more, unable to believe that Lance would ever forget to write someone’s name on a drink. He never forgot. Doing that was a surefire way to get people’s orders mixed up, and Lance was nothing if not great at making sure the customers were always happy. 

Pidge was still nowhere to be seen, and Lance didn’t look like he was going to be finished any time soon given the way the customer had begun waving their hands around and gesturing to the menu as they spoke. Keith sighed. Technically he wasn’t on the clock or in his employee hat and apron, which meant technically he wasn’t representing Castleship Coffees and wasn’t actually required to be polite to the customers right now.

With an impish grin Keith leaned over the edge of the pick-up counter. “Absolutely disgusting caramel macchiato with enough sugar to put someone in a coma for one nameless and shameless customer.”

He grinned to himself, possibly more amused than he should be. He could practically feel Lance glaring daggers in his back.

“Any takers?” he yelled once more. “If the sugar doesn't kill you the atrocious combination of caramel, hazelnut, and chocolate surely will.”

A shadow fell over Keith’s face, someone clearing their throat as Keith turned his head to see a very familiar face staring down at him. 

“I’m afraid that’s mine,” Shiro said softly, the warm pads of his fingers brushing against Keith’s knuckles as he leaned over and plucked the drink from Keith’s hands. “I know it’s kind of disgusting but—”

“You like things sweet,” Keith breathed, body paralyzed as he stared at Shiro. _Shiro._ His Shiro was standing in front of him in his place of work smiling at him with that same smile he got on his face when he played with puppies or ate macaroni and cheese with extra cheese on his cheat days. Or well, not _his_ Shiro he reminded himself. Not really. A technicality that was entirely Keith’s own fault since he’d been too scared to do anything about his feelings.

“I do,” Shiro agreed, lifting the drink up and taking a sip. His smile, if possible, grew even wider. “Wow, this is incredible. You made this?”

Keith’s entire face heated as he realized he was still half-draped across the pick-up counter with his mouth hanging open staring at the man of his dreams. He hopped up, smoothing down the front of his shirt and wishing he’d picked something that hadn’t been lying on the floor of his closet collecting wrinkles for the last week. Fuck, at least it was clean.

“You uh...you do work here, right?” Shiro said, looking almost nervous. “I know you’re not in uniform like the guy who took my order, but I thought I saw you making this.”

Keith blinked. Words. He was supposed to be using his brain to make words.

“I made it,” he answered, wishing not for the first time that he was better at talking to people. Small talk had never been his strong suit.

Shiro’s eyes brightened as he lifted his coffee and took another long, slow sip—his eyelids fluttering shut as he hummed in pleasure. Keith swallowed, completely unprepared for the sensation of complete arousal that assaulted him at the image of someone drinking something that vile. Fuck but Shiro was handsome.

“You’re really good,” Shiro said once he’d opened his eyes again. “This is perfect.”

Keith shrugged. “It’s just coffee. What are you doing here?”

Shiro’s eyes widened and he ducked his head, wisps of white hair falling into his eyes. When he lifted his head back up, his eyes were alight with something Keith couldn’t read. All he knew was that it was a _look._ “I’m sorry. I thought...Lance said it was alright.” He rubbed his prosthetic across his cheek looking remorseful. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable or overstep or anything. I completely understand if the video was too much or you’re not interested. At least let me return your jacket. It’s in my car.”

Keith knew that was the perfect time to tell Shiro he was wrong. That Keith wanted him more than he was used to wanting anything. Except he could feel the curious eyes of Lance and Pidge boring into him, and he couldn’t have an audience for the things he wanted to say.

“Where’s your car?” Keith asked, already trying to scrub the look of disappointment on Shiro’s face from his brain. 

“It’s just out front.”

Keith nodded, placing both hands on the counter before hopping over.

Shiro’s mouth fell open, an adorably surprised expression on his face that had Keith biting his bottom lip and shooting Shiro a shy smile.

“Is there anything you’re not good at?” Shiro asked as they weaved their way past the line by the register towards the front door.

It took Keith a full ten seconds to realize Shiro wasn’t being sarcastic. “Small talk,” Keith answered honestly.

Shiro’s lip twitched up in the corner. “Oh I don’t know about that, you seem to be doing just fine.”

Something small and dormant in Keith’s chest flared to life. Shiro thought Keith was rejecting him, and he was still acting as if he liked him. He was still being kind and decent and treating him exactly the same as he had before. Whatever Shiro felt for Keith was clearly more than just a fleeting superficial attraction. Keith still wasn’t sure he understood it, but he thought perhaps he was starting to believe it.

“There’s my car. But uh...yeah, you know what my car looks like already,” Shiro laughed, rubbing his left hand across the back of his neck and hiding his face behind his coffee. “I’ll get your jacket and then you can get back to your friends.”

“I want more than just the jacket,” Keith blurted out, swallowing down the rush of nausea building in the pit of his stomach. Shiro stumbled, turning confused eyes on Keith who forced out the next words before he lost his nerve. “I like you. A lot. Like...fuck, a lot.”

“Oh. You...you do?” Shiro said softly. He licked his lips and took one step closer to Keith. There was undeniable disbelief in his voice, but the smile spreading across his face was enough to push away any lingering fear Keith had about his confession.

“I’m sorry I didn’t contact you after you posted the video. It was nice. Really nice.”

“Yeah? I thought maybe it was too much. Or you just weren’t interested.”

“I was kind of intimidated, to be honest.”

Shiro’s face scrunched together in an endearingly confused expression. “Of what?”

“You!” Keith said, waving his arms at Shiro’s general direction. He let his eyes roam over Shiro’s body, appreciating for the first time the way the white thermal he was wearing clung to his broad shoulders and trim waist. His eyes went lower, his heart racing at the well-fitting jeans and the way they clung to the expanse of his thick thighs and long legs. When he dragged his eyes back up it was to see a rosy blush spreading across the bridge of Shiro’s nose and cheeks. “It’s not just your looks though. I uh...might not have been entirely truthful before when I said I’d only seen a few videos. I’ve seen a lot. Possibly all of them and you’re just...fuck, you’re incredible.”

“So what you’re saying is you like me,” Shiro said, his voice soft but steady. 

Keith blew the fringe from his eyes, gaze unrelenting. “Yes.”

“That’s good because I like you too,” Shiro offered.

This time Keith didn’t bother trying to contain his smile. “I did sort of guess that much from the video.”

“Oh my god, I really did that,” Shiro breathed. 

“You really did that,” Keith echoed, his heart racing. 

“So does that mean if I asked you on a date tomorrow you’d say yes?” Shiro asked.

“I have to work tomorrow.” Shiro’s smile fell instantly but Keith grinned, moving into his space and laying his hand atop the other man’s forearm. “But you could take me out tonight.”

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah, on one condition,” Keith said, fighting back another smile.

“Oh yeah, and what might that be?” 

“I get to drive.”

Shiro blinked before he let out a laugh that rumbled deep in his chest. “I guess I earned that one.”

“So what do you say? You up for it?”

“Definitely,” Shiro answered without hesitation, a glint of excitement in his eyes. “Except let me pick you up. I’ve got a reputation to fix. I promise not to run out of gas this time.”

Keith cocked his head to the side and studied Shiro, taking in the slow rise and fall of his chest and the open way he was watching Keith. It was unnerving to realize how rapidly he wanted to say yes to anything Shiro asked. There was still a nagging voice in the back of his head trying to shout _he’ll be disappointed when he gets to know the real you_ but it was being drowned out by the strength of Shiro’s smile.

“Pick me up at six.”

 

****

**~~~~~~~**

Keith would’ve loved to say he hadn’t spent the last twenty-five minutes pacing the floor of his poky little apartment and peeking through the living room blinds that looked down over the visitor parking every sixty seconds, but that would’ve made him a liar. He knew it was ridiculous. He’d told Shiro to pick him up at six, and it was still ten till, but Keith never had been good at waiting. Waiting left too much time to think, and boy was Keith over-thinking.

After leaving Shiro at the coffee shop under the guise of some errands he needed to run and the promise of _later_ , he’d gone home and spent the next hour futilely texting Lance and begging for help in deciding what to wear. Lance had been absolutely no help because his number one suggestion was to go in as little clothing as possible. When Keith flat out refused to go in a tight tank top and hot pants, his next unhelpful suggestion had been to wear a shirt that said _Shiro’s number one fan_. That was the point Keith had stopped texting him completely and buried his face in the sofa cushions where he’d stayed until a quarter past five when he realized if he didn’t change now he might end up wearing the same thing he’d seen Shiro in earlier, and while those clothes had seemed find to run downtown to see Lance, they absolutely were not fine for a date with the hottest man alive.

By that point Keith was no longer crippled with too much time to wallow in self-doubt and had ended up pulling on his favorite pair of black skinny jeans, a plain white t-shirt he never wore, which meant it was impeccably clean and unwrinkled, and his red leather jacket. He’d then stared at his reflection for a full ten minutes, fussing with the hairs that kept falling into his eyes or attempting to comb out the small knot in the back before giving up and shoving the longest bits of his hair up into a low ponytail and praying Shiro thought that kind of thing was hot.

By the time his phone was buzzing to let Keith know Shiro had pulled into visitor parking, Keith was already texting him back not to bother coming up as he jogged down the stairs two at a time. 

“Wow, you’re fast,” Shiro said in surprise as he leaned across the leather seat to push the passenger door open.

“Yeah, fast,” Keith agreed with a soft snort, biting back the truth, which was that he’d been dressed for forty-five minutes and had spent the last six of those with his nose pressed against the window as he stared unblinking at the turn for the complex parking.

He dropped down into the seat, reaching for the seat belt that somehow managed to slip from his hands and slap back against the door. He swallowed, reaching for it again and shoving it into the buckle, too afraid to look over and see if Shiro was watching him. Then, because apparently getting into confined spaces with someone he barely knew turned Keith into a completely different person, he placed his hands into his lap and folded them. Almost immediately he flung them out to rest on his knees then sighed feeling like an idiot. He shifted again, crossing his ankles and tucking his thumbs into the belt across his waist to give them something to hold on to. 

“Comfortable?” Shiro asked once he seemed sure Keith was done acting like he’d never set foot in a car before. “You want the radio or the air conditioning on? The seat adjusts up and down too, or if you prefer fresh air I can stay off the freeway so you can have your window rolled down.”

“I’m good,” Keith lied, feeling more aware of his body than he had in his entire life. Had his legs always been so long? Where the fuck did he usually put his hands if he wasn’t driving? Fuck, the second he got into the car it was as if he forgot how to sit. 

“So where are we going?” Keith asked, hoping that was suitable small talk. 

After getting Keith’s phone number and address, Shiro had insisted on surprising Keith about their date. Of course he’d followed that insistence up by a five-minute conversation to ensure sure Keith was absolutely alright with the idea and an offer to do anything Keith wanted, which had been unexpectedly sweet and made Keith even more confident in telling Shiro yes. 

Keith hadn’t been lying when he’d told Shiro as long as they got to go somewhere together he was down for anything. Of course one glance at Shiro’s well-fitting charcoal-grey pants, pristine lavender button up shirt, and dark purple tie had Keith swallow down a rush of nerves. It hadn’t even occurred to him Shiro might try to take him somewhere nice. He kicked his foot against the floor mat and wished he’d worn something besides his red Converse. 

“Well, I had a couple of ideas. I realized after I left that I wasn’t really sure what kinds of things you like to do for fun,” Shiro said, glancing in his rear-view mirror before backing out. 

Keith licked his lips wondering if there was a less pathetic way to say _I spend all my time working or playing video games_.

“I like a lot of stuff,” he said vaguely.

Shiro gave him a quick smile before turning his eyes back on the road. “Stuff, huh? Wow, I didn’t realize we were going to overshare so quickly on our first date. I can’t imagine what kinds of deeply personal things you might tell me on our next date.”

Keith’s fingers curled around the seat belt as he turned his eyes on Shiro. _Next date._ Shiro was already assuming there would be a next date. Shit. That was, god Keith didn’t even know what that was. It was something that made the ball of tension pooling in the pit of his stomach unfurl just a bit. Maybe he wasn’t going to fuck this up after all.

“I spend most of my time working. But if I’m not there I’m usually fixing up my car or playing video games. I know, lame.”

Shiro shook his head. “Not lame. I love video games. Besides all that tells me is you like things that are action oriented. You don’t like to be passive do you?”

“Uh, no,” he answered. He’d never thought of it like that, but it sounded about right. He wasn’t big on just watching television or reading. He liked to do things where he felt like he was a part of what was happening.

“So I’m going to guess a fancy dinner and movie isn’t really up your alley?” Shiro asked, flipping on his blinker as he switched lanes to merge onto the freeway.

“I mean, I could be persuaded, if the food was good. Or the company,” he paused, pleased at the flush that spread across Shiro’s cheeks. “But to be honest I might be a little bit uncomfortable. Fancy isn’t really my thing. Movies are alright, though, but...maybe for a later date. They’re not great for getting to know someone.”

He swallowed down his nerves. If Shiro could reference another date then so could Keith. 

“Sounds good to me. I think I have just the idea. If you trust me?”

“I trust you,” Keith answered without hesitation. He didn’t miss the smile that earned him, warmth blooming in his chest at what it felt like to put that look on Shiro’s face.

It was almost impossible not to feel relaxed around Shiro. He had a dry sense of humor so that it sometimes took Keith a second to realize he was joking. He was self-deprecating instead of cocky, and he was a complete and total nerd. Keith need not have worried his car and video game hobbies might seem dorky, because the second he mentioned Paladins of Voltron Shiro’s face had lit up and he’d spent the next fifteen minutes describing his own character in the game named Jiro—a paladin whose sole desire in the game was apparently to collect good deed coins. Keith had felt his own smile grow as Shiro confessed he never chose anything but a paladin and usually ended up dead, but apparently still loved the game despite being a bit shit at it. It was ridiculous and endearing, and Keith wasn’t sure how to say _that seems like you_ without sounding patronizing. 

By the time Shiro was pulling into an over-sized parking lot Keith wasn’t familiar with, most of Keith’s initial awkwardness had managed to dissipate to be replaced by curiosity and excitement. 

“So, where are we?” Keith asked once they stepped out of the car, the sound of his door slamming echoing loudly. He’d been tempted to ask at least a dozen times as Shiro wove in and out of traffic and followed the navigation on his phone to where they were heading, but he’d resisted the urge, wanting Shiro to be able to surprise him. Keith had never been big on surprises, usually too impatient or nosy to ever let anyone get a chance, but Shiro had made him bite his tongue in the hope of seeing his earlier smile spread across his face once more.

“We’re at the pier,” Shiro said. “Have you ever been?”

Keith shook his head. He wasn’t sure why, but he rarely went out of town to do things. “No.”

“Since you said you liked video games I was hoping maybe you liked other types of games too,” Shiro offered. “My parents used to take me here when I was a kid to celebrate. I used to mow all the neighbors’ lawns and then save up my quarters to play the pinball machines and PAC-MAN in the vintage arcade when we came. After my pockets were empty they’d buy me a corn dog, and then we’d walk along the pier people watching. If I was really lucky sometimes we had enough money to play one of the games of chance. I still remember when I was like six or seven, there was this giant lion I wanted. It was black with these massive red wings. Man, it was so cool. My dad tried to tell me that people didn’t really win those big prizes, and when that didn’t deter me my mom tried to reason with me.” He stopped, seeming to realize he was rambling, and shoved his hands into his pockets. “Anyway, that was a long time ago. I haven’t been here in years but I thought...I thought we might have fun.”

It was hard to tell in the dim lighting of the underground garage, but if Keith wasn’t mistaken Shiro was blushing. There was also a faraway look on his face as Keith tried to recall Shiro ever talking about his parents on his channel. He’d never given it much thought, but he couldn’t remember him mentioning them. 

“Did you ever win the lion?” Keith asked, leaning against the back of the car.

Shiro shook his head, resting his hands on the trunk and leaning back, his side brushing up against Keith as he scooted closer than was necessary. His proximity sent goosebumps down Keith’s arms, and he was glad he had on his jacket to hide the effect that just being close to the other man was having on him.

“Nah, I lost spectactually. I spent months mowing extra lawns and doing chores around the house, but by the time we came back here a few months later the lion had been replaced by a giant robot. It was cool but...it wasn’t the same.” He shrugged his shoulders but Keith had a feeling Shiro had just shared something more important than he wanted to admit. “You win some you lose some right?”

Keith nodded, already absolutely certain he was going to win Shiro a stuffed animal or die trying tonight.

“So,” Keith asked, knocking his shoulder against Shiro’s. “You always dress up so much to eat fried food and play carnival games?”

This time there was no maybe about it. Shiro was definitely blushing. “Ah, no. I feel a little bit like an asshole to be honest. I only have this tie because of a business meeting I went to a few months ago. My business manager told me wearing a tie would help me get taken seriously.”

Keith laughed. “You trying to get me to take you seriously, Shiro?”

Shiro groaned, burying his face in his hands. 

“No,” he mumbled. “At least not like that.”

“I mean, if it makes any difference you look really hot,” Keith added, taking pity on Shiro’s embarrassment. He left off mentioning the fact that Shiro would even look hot in a trash bag. Some things needed to be saved for second dates after all, and fuck he was already hoping there would be a second date.

Shiro dropped his hands to look at Keith. “Yeah?”

Keith nodded, reaching out and running the dark purple silk through his fingertips. “Like a sexy professor or maybe a CEO.”

Shiro snorted, reaching for the knot and undoing the tie. “I don’t wanna look like a professor. Shit.”

Keith laughed. “I said _hot_ professor.”

Shiro ducked his head as he fumbled with the tie. “Thanks.”

Taking pity on him Keith moved to stand in front of Shiro, slipping in between the V of his thighs as he carefully undid the knot, loosening it until the circle was big enough to slip off over Shiro’s head.

”I used to to do my dad’s ties,” he said at Shiro’s curious look, dropping the tie in Shiro’s upturned palm.

“I knew you were multi-talented,” Shiro said, laying the tie across his left thigh as he undid the top few buttons on his shirt. He tugged it open and took a deep breath as he rolled his neck. Keith’s eyes were drawn to the elegant arch of Shiro’s neck and the pale collarbones. As if that weren’t distracting enough, Shiro then undid the cuff buttons and rolled them all the way up to his elbows, his strong forearms on full display. “Better?”

Keith nearly choked on his own saliva. Shiro looked like a walking wet dream. Better didn’t even begin to cover it. “Much,” he managed to get out.

“Good,” Shiro said with a grin, rising to stand. Keith stepped back to give him space, watching with interest as Shiro unlocked the trunk to throw the tie in. “So you ready to lose? he asked, unaware of Keith’s staring.

“What’s all that,” Keith asked before he could think better of it, pointing to Shiro’s meticulously clean trunk that had three different color-coordinated outfits laid out. On the left was something close to what he usually wore on his channel, which consisted of a pair of plain black joggers and a black long sleeve athletic shirt and a pair of black sneakers. Beside that was a pair of dark-wash jeans, a white t-shirt, and a plain white sweater with brand new white tennis shoes, and beside that was what looked to be a dinner jacket and a pair of sleek black dress shoes that would’ve tipped Shiro’s possibly overdressed outfit into the _definitely overdressed category_.

Shiro looked like a dog caught in headlights. “I, uh,” he stopped, rubbing his hand on the back of his neck again, an action that Keith was beginning to recognize as nervousness. “I couldn’t decide what to wear so I brought back-up outfits in case I panicked on the way to pick you up and changed my mind.”

“Why were you worried about what to wear?” Keith asked with furrowed eyebrows.

“Because I...I wanted to impress you,” Shiro said as if it were obvious.

“ _You_ wanted to impress _me_ ,” Keith echoed, feeling like he was in some sort of alternate universe. This felt entirely backward. He’d been so concerned with disappointing Shiro. 

Shiro still looked slightly embarrassed, but he slammed the trunk shut and nodded. “I mean, that's usually what happens when you like someone. You’re funny and smart and so fucking hot and I—”

Keith didn’t let him finish, surging forward, an act that knocked Shiro’s ass back down on the trunk of the car as Keith pressed his lips to Shiro’s. It wasn’t even like he’d consciously chosen to do it. One minute he’d been standing there in awe that someone he liked so much liked him back, and then next moment his body had been in motion.

Shiro let out a soft noise of surprise, his hands flying up to rest at Keith’s waist. The hesitation lasted for less than a second before Shiro’s hands squeezed softly, urging Keith to fall back between his spread legs. Keith’s brain was screaming at him that he was doing this all wrong, that the date was supposed to come before the kissing, but he couldn’t do anything to stop the rush of need that was only quieted as his lips gilded against Shiro's.

Shiro didn’t seem at all bothered by the unexpected turn of events, his left hand drifting in Keith’s jacket and his other on his hip as he tilted his head and opened his lips just enough to let Keith’s tongue slip inside, and then Keith knew the painfully embarrassing noise had come from him but fuck it all, Shiro tasted better than he smelled, and the rush of adrenaline was enough to make Keith weak in the knees. Everything in his world narrowed down to the gentle rise and fall of Shiro’s chest against his and the steady thump thump of their hearts as they kissed slow and languid. It didn’t feel like a first kiss. There was no hesitancy but rather a tender exploration as Keith breathed into the kiss.

In the end it was a car alarm two rows over that brought Keith back to his senses.

“Fuck, sorry,” Keith apologized automatically, nearly leaping a foot back as the alarm blared loudly. He blinked at Shiro, who still had his eyes shut. His lips were kiss swollen, and all Keith could think was _wow_.

“Are you really?” Shiro asked as his eyes fluttered open. He lifted his hand up and dragged his thumb across his bottom lip.

 _My mouth was just there_ Keith thought dazedly, assaulted by the most intense urge to shove Shiro on top of his car and kiss him again, passersby be damned. He needed to get ahold of himself.

“No, I’m not,” he answered truthfully. 

“That’s good,” Shiro said, as he pushed off the car and moved closer to Keith. He grinned, letting his left arm come around to wrap around Keith’s shoulder. “Let’s go have some fun.”

The entire walk from the car out of the parking garage and onto the sidewalk Keith felt aware of his body in a way he wasn’t used to. Even more, he felt aware of Shiro’s. Shiro’s arm was long and heavy, but comfortably settled around his shoulder, and Keith found himself leaning his side against Shiro’s. He’d often seen couples walking like that and wondered if they were scared the other one would run away or something. It looked awkward and hard to walk, and while Keith definitely had to think about his own stride to stay in step with Shiro, he liked the way it felt to be pressed side by side.

He wasn’t sure if it was his imagination, but he swore people kept staring at them as they passed. It was hard to know if it was because people recognized Shiro, or if their eyes were just naturally drawn to him. It was easy to see why. Shiro was over six feet of muscle, with a face so beautiful it would’ve made Michelangelo weep, and a smile to match. Keith was glad Lance wasn’t there because he would’ve said Keith was preening, but fuck it all, it wasn’t Keith’s fault that having Shiro at his side whispering things in his ear made him feel ten feet tall. It was intoxicating and arousing and Keith really, really liked it.

They made their way through the throngs of families and couples on dates, up the stairs and out onto the pier, and for just a moment Keith was left speechless. He tried to figure out why he’d never been here before. Granted, he and Lance had grown up a few towns over, and after high school when Lance’s family had moved Keith had followed. But they’d been there for nearly two years now and he was hard-pressed to figure out how in the world he’d never been _here._

It was almost like stepping into another world. It was hard for Keith to know what to focus on or where to look. Now that the sun had set, the entire pier was lit up in an array of strung up-lights focusing on the large ferris wheel at the very end of the pier lit up in pinks and blues. Keith was distantly aware of the sound of the waves crashing against the pilings beneath them, but louder than that was the hum of happy chatter, the ding of carnival games and a cheerful tune coming from a small children’s carousel a few booths over.

“I was going to ask if you’d really never been here, but the look on your face says it all,” Shiro said, leaning down so Keith could him over all the noises.

“Sorry,” Keith apologized automatically, snapping his mouth shut.

“No, oh my god, don’t apologize,” Shiro said, dropping his arm and moving to stand in front of Keith. He touched Keith’s chin with his hand, a silent plea for him to look up. Keith did. “It’s sweet. I, uh...I kinda like that I get to be the first one to bring you here.”

“Yeah?”

Shiro nodded, his thumb still resting lightly against Keith’s chin. “Yeah.”

Keith swallowed, acutely aware of the shape of Shiro’s lips as he spoke. He knew what those lips felt like against his own, knew the kind of strength and gentleness Shiro’s hands were capable of. Fuck, how was he going to survive this date?

Shiro seemed to realize he was still touching Keith’s face as he dropped his hand with a bashful smile. “So, what did you want to do first? They took the arcade out last year, but they still sell the world's best corn dogs, and the games are really fun if you don’t mind losing. Or we could just walk around, maybe go on the ferris wheel. Anything you want.”

 _I just want you_ Keith thought, his chest fluttering uncontrollably. 

It was hard to shake the feeling that this was just a dream, and he was going to wake up soon. Unbidden, thoughts flashed through his mind, images from Shiro’s videos he’d seen dozens of times—the sound of his laughter, the way his eyes crinkled up at the corners when he was happy, or the way his lips turned up in a smile—and yet none of those compared to standing in front of Shiro for real. 

None of those things had come close to encapsulating what it might feel like to be the one who could make him smile, or the reason his eyes wrinkled up with laugh lines. 

“I want to play a game,” Keith answered, his earlier determination flaring as he eyed the throngs of people playing the carnival games behind Shiro. 

“Anything in particular you like? They’ve got a hoops game, water guns, this one where you roll little balls into circles to make your horse move, tossing a ping pong ball into little cups—”

“That last one sounds easy,” Keith said, shoving his hands in his pocket and falling into step beside Shiro. He was torn between watching Shiro or letting his eyes wander across the pier. 

“Ha, that’s what they want you to think,” Shiro said, placing his right hand at the base of Keith’s back to gently guide him in the right direction. “It’s so much harder than it looks.”

“I mean, I think I can handle this,” Keith said, thinking back to the three weeks he and Lance had spent the entire summer after graduating high school perfecting their ping pong in red plastic cup shots in case they ever happened to be asked to join a round of beer pong. They’d never been asked, which was likely because they never went to any parties. 

Keith felt pretty confident he was going to nail this game.

“Well, hello there gentleman, can I interest you in a game of chance today?” the worked said cheerfully. He was wearing a red striped shirt and a bright red apron. Behind him the sole other worker was scurrying around collecting the ping pong balls that were flying around. Keith’s eyes swept over the game, taking in the pool of water and floating cups that were spinning in circles, likely propelled by unseen jets. “Three balls for a dollar, twenty balls for five dollars or ten dollars for a bucket.”

“What do you think?” Shiro asked, his breath ghosting across the shell of Keith’s ear.

“A bucket,” Keith answered, reaching for his wallet.

Shiro shook his head. “Let me,” he said, reaching for his wallet and pulling out a ten dollar bill before Keith could object.

“Fine, but I’m winning you something,” Keith said.

Shiro grinned, wallet halfway to his pocket before he unfolded it once more and pulled out another ten. “Make that two buckets.”

The employee grinned, plopping down two buckets of wet ping pong balls in front of them.

“In order to get a prize you’ve got to get your ball to stay inside one of the colored cups. If it goes in one of the white ones it doesn’t count. Green cups earn you a small prize, yellow earns you a medium and blue gets a large.”

“And what happens if you land one in the gold cup?” he asked, eyeing the smallest little cup that seemed to be moving twice as fast at the others.

“That would be our jumbo prize,” the man said, nodding his head up to the ceiling where several oversize plushies hung from the ceiling. There was a massive green dragon, a chubby hippo, and a red lion. Keith’s breath caught in his throat. He was going to win Shiro that lion if it killed him. “I’ve been working here three years, though, and no one has won that yet, at least not in my shifts. Good luck, gentlemen. If you need more balls just give me a holler or a wave.”

Shiro waited until the man had turned his attention on another group of people before sliding one of the buckets in front of Keith. “Ready to lose?”

Keith felt a spike of excitement. Oh, so that was how he wanted to play. Well, two could play that game.

“No, but I hear you’ve got lots of experience.”

“Oh my god, burn,” Shiro laughed, clutching at his chest like he’d been wounded. “That’s brutal.”

Keith schooled his face into a mask of neutrality, though he was pretty sure the smile he was trying to hide was obvious. “Less talking and more doing, Shirogane.”

“Yes, sir,” Shiro laughed, mock saluting him before turning his eyes back onto the game. Keith let his gaze roam around the circle of people playing, trying to gauge their techniques but realizing that most people seemed to just be flinging their balls haphazardly and crossing their fingers—a choice that didn't seem to be working out for most of them.

When he turned back it was to see Shiro leaning on his elbows, one eye shut as he pulled his hand back and tossed the ball. It bounced into a white cup then plopped into the water. Keith watched him do three more balls, finding the intense concentration and seriousness with which he was chucking ping pong balls as ridiculous as it was endearing.

Shiro paused, cocking his head to the side as if suddenly sensing Keith’s gaze. In a panic Keith flung his hand out for a ball and grabbed two, flinging them towards the center. Both of them plopped into the water with a thud.

“You’ve gotta have a little more focus. Here, let me help,” Shiro said, abandoning his own bucket and moving to stand behind Keith. He bracketed Keith’s body with his own, Shiro’s thighs and chest pressed flush against him as he placed his hand atop Keith’s. It was on the tip of Keith’s tongue to point out the only reason he’d done so poorly was because he’d been ogling Shiro, but that confession was not only embarrassing but would’ve led to the removal of Shiro’s body against his own, and Keith didn’t favor the prospect of either one. 

“Patience yields focus,” Shiro whispered, guiding Keith’s hand into his bucket until his hand was closing around a ball. Then Shiro’s hands were on Keith’s hips and his mouth at Keith’s ear as he whispered, “Just be patient. Wait for the right cup to come to you.”

Keith was pretty sure this game was about five percent skill and ninety five percent luck, but he pretended to follow Shiro’s advice anyway, letting his breathing even out and waiting a good sixty seconds before he threw the next ball. It bounced twice before settling in a white cup directly beside a red one.

“That was fantastic,” Shiro said, moving back beside Keith.

“I lost.”

“Well, yeah. But you got it in a cup at least. I mean that’s something, right? More than me so far,” he laughed, grabbing one of his own balls and returning to his silly stance. Keith promptly averted his eyes, knowing he wasn’t going to win any over-sized plush if he spent all his time staring at Shiro’s ass.

Keith spent the next ten minutes slowly using half his bucket of ping pong balls, taking turns throwing his own and watching the way they bounced while trying to track which spots in the water table had the biggest speed traps. He wasn’t entirely sure what Shiro was doing but most of his bucket was gone and he’d yet to land a ball in a colored cup. A fact which had him frowning with every new attempt.

“What happened to patience yields focus,” Keith teased, watching as yet another one of his own balls ricocheted off the edge of a colored cup before landing in the water.

“It’s in the dark corner with all my balls,” Shiro deadpanned, his frown bordering very close on a pout as he realized he only had two balls left.

Keith snorted. There were only so many times he could hear, think, or say balls before reverting to the same juvenile sense of humor as a twelve-year-old. 

Watching the way the tiny ping pong balls got dwarfed in Shiro’s massive hands didn’t help his predicament either as Keith did his best not to think of other balls, watching as Shiro lost one then two more times. He sighed, pushing away his bucket and crossing his arms.

“You win some, you lose some,” Shiro said, looking like he was trying very hard to be positive. There was still half a frown on his face, and Keith knew he was really fucking gone for the other man by how adorable he found the fact that Shiro was apparently a bit of a sore loser.

“I’ve got a few left, maybe we’ll get lucky,” Keith said, trying not to get his own or Shiro’s hopes up. He was starting to feel more confident, but he wasn’t really prepared for Shiro to know that, at least not until Keith was sure he could win him something.

“I believe in you,” Shiro said, leaning his hip against the counter and turning his entire focus on Keith. He knew Shiro was mostly playing along, but those words were the small buffer of self-confidence he needed as he grabbed a ball and gently tossed it. Keith held his breath as the ball bounced out of a white cup then several feet over before thunking directly into a green cup.

“We have a winner!” the same man who’d sold them their ball announced. He walked over and plucked Keith’s ball from the cup before walking over and plopping down a small alien looking plushie. It had the body of an overgrown cucumber and six arms and legs and the most ridiculous facial expression Keith had ever seen. 

“Well done, Keith. It’s uh….it’s—” but Shiro didn’t seem to know what to call it as he turned it over in his hands.

“It’s fucking hideous.”

Shiro barked out a laugh. “Just a little bit.”

“You want it?” Keith asked.

Shiro shook his head. “To be honest I think his face might give me nightmares.”

“In that case I’ll save it and give it to Lance.”

Shiro laughed, turning the ugly plushie face down. “You’ve still got a few more. Think you’ll get lucky again?”

“That wasn’t luck, that was skill,” Keith said, feeling a bit more confident now that he’d actually succeeded in winning. Even if his prize had been hideous. 

“Oh yeah, you that confident, huh?” 

Keith shrugged feeling hot under the collar. Despite the chill in the air he was beginning to sweat in uncomfortable places, though whether it was from nerves or just being close to Shiro he didn’t have a clue. Possibly both. Either way, he shrugged off his leather jacket, his chest doing that funny thing again when he realized Shiro was already sticking out his arm to hold the jacket for him.

“Aren’t you a gentleman,” Keith teased. 

Shiro didn’t seem at all embarrassed as he took Keith’s jacket and carefully folded it over the crook of his left arm. “What can I say, I’m a little old fashioned. Besides, I know when something’s worth taking care of.”

“You wanna take care of me, huh?” Keith said under the impression Shiro must’ve been at least half joking. “Gonna pull out my chair or walk me back to my apartment later too?”

“I would if you’d let me,” Shiro answered seriously.

Keith’s body flushed. Fuck, that was—Keith didn’t even know what that was. He was used to fighting off any and all attempts to coddle or baby him. The only reason Lance succeeded in halfway mothering him was because they had an unspoken rule that at no time was Lance to acknowledge doing his dishes for him or bringing him leftovers from his mom’s house. Keith was staunchly self-sufficient and always had been. But fuck, that didn’t mean the idea of being treated right by a man like Shiro wasn’t one of the most appealing things he’d ever heard.

“Only if you let me do it for you too,” Keith shot back. The only thing that rivaled the idea of letting Shiro take care of him was the idea of being able to do the same in turn. Keith’s heart thudded erratically in his chest at the idea of being someone’s equal like that—of caring for someone but also being cared for in equal measures.

Shiro inhaled slowly, licking his lips as an almost shy smile blossomed on his face. “That’d be really nice, Keith.”

“Which one do you like?” Keith blurted out, picking up another ball and waving his arm towards the prizes. He needed to do something to change the subject before he got too far ahead of himself and blurted out _is it crazy that I feel like I could love you_.

He rolled it between his hands, watching Shiro as his eyes roamed over the wide array of plush prizes ranging from hideous to adorable. It was unmistakable to see the way his gaze lingered on the massive stuffed lion even if he didn’t seem to want to admit it.

“Why, you gonna win me one?” Shiro asked, taking the change of subject in stride and looking unexpectedly coy.

Keith nearly dropped the ball. “I just wanna know which one you like. I can’t make any promises, but you know..” he trailed off with what he hoped was a casual shrug. 

“I’d like anything if it came from you,” Shiro answered, and Keith had the distinct feeling that it wasn’t a lie. There was something undeniably earnest about Shiro. He wasn’t just saying something because he thought it was what Keith might want to hear. He looked like he genuinely meant it, and Keith had never wanted to please someone the way he wanted to please Shiro in that moment.

He looked down at his bucket and did a quick mental count. He had eight balls left. Based on his experience so far there was a fairly decent chance he might be able to get a medium prize, but winning the jumbo one was a complete shot in the dark since there was only one gold cup and it never seemed to stop moving. Keith knew that realistically Shiro probably would be happy with anything he won him—well, anything aside from the creepy alien plushie—but that didn’t mean Keith wasn’t still going to try for the best. If Shiro had spent his childhood wanting an over-sized lion, then Keith wanted to win him the fucking lion.

His first ball landed in the water with a plop, earning him a pathetic look from Shiro.

“I don’t need anything, honest,” Shiro said in what was probably meant to be sweet but only managed to make Keith more determined to win one. Keith was stubborn above all else.

The next few came close to landing in cups, though only white ones, but bounced back into the water in the end anyway. It wasn’t until his fifth ball that he came precariously close to landing it in a red one, though it ultimately bounced back out too.

His nerves getting the best of him, his next one flew completely over the water and bounced onto the floor. Keith refused to look at Shiro in case he was looking at him with pity. Fuck, that had to have been the world's worst throw.

He closed his eyes and took a steadying breath as he reached for the last two balls. He threw the first one, wincing when it bounced off the rim of the gold cup only to plop into the water right beside it.

“Oh wow, that was close,” Shiro said, a detectable wince in his voice.

 _Not close enough_ , Keith thought, his hand beginning to sweat. He turned to glance at Shiro and felt his chest seize up. Shiro wasn’t watching the prizes or the the cups spinning in the water. He only had eyes for Keith, and there wasn’t a lick of pity there, just something open and soft that made Keith ache to fist his hands in Shiro’s shirt and remind himself of what he’d tasted like.

With a renewed sense of purpose Keith turned his attention back to the game and let his eyes focus on the small golden cup tracking its movement. Keith knew he was taking forever, but by the third full circle Shiro was still waiting beside him patiently. Keith waited until it was farther away, lifting his arm up and throwing the ball. He held his breath as it bounced into the closest white cup before flying across the water and directly into the golden cup.

“Holy fucking shit!” Shiro yelled, dropping Keith’s jacket onto the countertop and pulling him into an exuberant hug. Shiro’s arms were strong, his chest warm as Keith’s cheek fell against his shoulder. 

Just as rapidly as the hug had come, it ended as Shiro pulled out of the embrace looking sheepish.

“Sorry, I ugh, got excited.”

“You don’t need to apologize. I liked it,” Keith assured him. “I—”

“Well I’ll be damned you really did it!” a voice yelled, interrupting Keith. He looked over to see the man who’d sold them their balls walking over with a long pole. “I never thought I’d see the day. Congratulations, which one do you want.”

“The lion,” Keith answered immediately, watching as the employee lifted the pole into the air and plopped the giant lion in front of Keith. Up close it was even bigger than Keith realized, with a long fuzzy tail and massive eyes. It only occurred to Keith then that one of then was going to have to carry this fucker around all night.

Keith wrapped his arms around the massive stuffed animal and turned to Shiro. “Here, this is uh...for you.”

Shiro blinked. “You won me a lion.”

“I did.”

“I’ve wanted one of these since I was seven,” Shiro whispered, taking the lion as if it were made of gold. He held it out at arm’s length to examine it with a pleased look before pulling it close to his chest and _hugging_ it, at which point Keith knew with almost painful clarity that Shiro was exactly the kind of man he could love. Beneath the handsome exterior there was something unexpectedly dorky and sweet. Shiro turned his eyes in Keith, his chin resting atop the lion’s head, and smiled. “Thank you.”

“It was nothing,” Keith said, cocking his head to the side watching Shiro. The lion seemed slightly smaller against Shiro’s hulking frame, though just barely. It was still at least four feet tall and wider across than Keith. He had no idea how Shiro was going to walk around with it all night or if it would even fit in his backseat, but fuck was it worth it for the look of happiness on Shiro’s face. 

“You hungry?” Shiro asked. 

“I could eat,” Keith answered. 

“So are you a corn dog kind of man? Chili fries? They’ve got funnel cake too that’s to die for. It’s piled high with whipped cream and cherry pie filling. Or we could just walk around and you can tell me when you see something you want,” Shiro said as he began to walk towards the middle of the pier where most of the food stalls seemed to be housed.

“I like everything,” Keith answered. “I’m not picky. I’ll pretty much eat anything.”

Shiro turned to give him an appraising look, their shoulders pressing together as Shiro tried to avoid knocking into people with his massive lion. Keith didn’t mind one bit.

“You’ve gotta have a favorite though, yeah? Like pretend you could eat anything in the entire world. What would it be?” Shiro asked.

“My dad’s spaghetti,” Keith answered without pause. “He died almost three years ago, and he was a pretty shitty cook but the one thing he learned to make at the fire station was spaghetti. It was probably nothing special, but my dad used to make it every Friday night. We’d sit together on the couch and watch old episodes of the Twilight Zone and eat pasta until we were in a carb coma. I miss him.” 

The second the words were out of his mouth he inhaled sharply, feeling exposed. He hadn’t meant to say all that. He rarely talked about his dad anymore, even with Lance. He’d gotten used to pushing away all his memories to avoid the ones that hurt.

Shiro stopped walking, his eyes on Keith as he offered him a soft smile. It wasn’t full of pity or awkwardness, just soul-deep understanding. “I miss my mom’s sukiyaki. Sometimes when I close my eyes and focus long enough I swear I can almost taste it. I’ve tried to learn to make it from cookbooks and YouTube tutorials but...it never tastes the same, which is possibly because I’m the world’s worst cook.”

“I have seen your cooking videos. You’re pretty fucking awful,” Keith laughed, surprised at how easy it was to do after sharing something so personal. Shiro hadn’t looked at him in pity or pried for more information, just offered a bit of his own past in solidarity.

“Oh god, some of those are so embarrassing. Sometimes I forget people know things about me,” Shiro admitted, leaning back against the empty table behind him. He deposited the lion safely on top before crossing his arms over his chest. “I feel at a little bit of a disadvantage. You know so much about me, and I know hardly anything about you.”

“What do you wanna know?” Keith asked, acutely aware of the ten inches of empty space between them.

“Anything. Everything,” Shiro answered. 

“ _Oh._ ”

“Sorry, was that too much again? I uh, I mean anything you want to tell me,” Shiro said, uncrossing his arms and rubbing the palms of his hands across his thighs. Something about the hint of nervousness in Shiro’s demeanor made it impossible for Keith’s own insecurity to surface. How could he possibly worry that Shiro didn’t like him when every single thing Shiro said or did made it clear that for whatever reason he seemed as enamored with Keith as Keith was with him?

Ignoring the buzzing in his ears, Keith took two steps forward until he was once again sequestered between the spread of Shiro’s thighs. “My favorite color is red. I pick out all the purple Skittles because they’re disgusting. I sleep on the left side of the bed, and I hog the blankets. My best friend Lance is a pain in the ass, but he’s the closest thing to family I have. I’ve always wanted a dog. Sometimes when I ride my motorcycle I try to drive fast enough that I can pretend I’m flying. I dropped out of college, and everyone thinks it's because I don’t have any ambition, but the truth is one day I wanna open up my own restoration garage. I’m scared I liked you too much.”

“Keith,” Shiro whispered, his voice barely audible over the crackle of the loudspeaker announcing two chili dogs up for order.

“There, now we’re equal for saying too much,” Keith tried to joke, his heart threatening to jump out of his chest. 

He felt incapable of moving even if he wanted to, his eyes drawn to the way Shiro’s white hair was lit up in an array of pinks and blues from the neon LED sign for cotton candy behind his head. Keith liked him _so much_. He’d been afraid of Shiro finding out Keith wasn’t what he thought, or even perhaps finding out that Shiro wasn’t everything _he_ thought. Not once had he let himself consider what it might be like if they were good together. Standing in front of Shiro now he could barely believe he’d almost missed out on this.

He didn’t like Shiro because he was sort of famous, or just because he was unfairly handsome. He liked him for the bad jokes he’d made in the desert and the pack of red licorice Keith could still taste if he closed his eyes and thought about it hard enough. He liked him for being brave enough to make the video even when Keith hadn’t been brave enough to answer. Liked him for the trunk full of clothes he’d brought and the way he’d hugged the lion as if it was the best gift he’d ever been given. He liked him for the way he seemed to be able to put Keith at ease without even trying. Fuck, he even liked him for his godawful coffee order.

“Nothing about you could be too much,” Shiro said, his hand reaching out to cup the side of Keith’s face. His palm was broad, his fingers gentle as as they toyed with the hairs that had fallen out of the ponytail behind his ear. “I want to kiss you so much right now.”

“You can. You can do anything you want,” Keith said, wishing they were doing more kissing and less talking right about now. Not that he didn’t want to talk to Shiro. God, he wanted to talk to him more than he’d ever wanted to talk to anyone in his entire life. But fuck it all, Shiro’s body was hard and warm beneath him and Shiro was so beautiful it was almost painful, and all Keith wanted to do was fist his hand in that floof and kiss him until he found out what it sounded like when Shiro felt so good he couldn’t keep the noises in any more.

Shiro groaned, his other hand slipping around to the back of Keith’s waist as he gently urged him forward until Keith’s chest was falling against Shiro’s. “Don’t say that, or I’ll want to do a lot more than kiss you.”

“I uh, I’ve never done that before,” Keith breathed, his face so close to Shiro’s he could see a single freckle just below his left eye.

“Done what exactly?” Shiro asked as his thumb stroked back and forth across Keith’s cheek.

Keith swallowed wondering if there was a non-pathetic way to say almost anything. Did the blow job he’d gotten for his sixteenth birthday from a girl who liked him, or the one-off handjob in eleventh grade he’d exchanged with the football captain only to be threatened with death if he told anyone five minutes later count as sex? Keith didn’t have any fucking idea. 

By the time he’d properly realized he was gay and it wasn’t just a phase his dad had died, and he’d thrown himself into surviving the end of high school. Then he’d tried to survive college, and when that failed he’d thrown himself into fixing his car and working long hours to get more money to fix his car. The last thing on his mind had been trying to figure out how to awkwardly decide if another human being liked him enough to want to to play a part in him losing his socially constructed title of virgin.

“I haven’t done almost anything,” Keith blurted. “But it doesn’t mean I don’t want to!” he added when he saw the look on Shiro’s face.

“We can wait, take it slow,” Shiro whispered, pressing a chaste kiss to Keith’s lips. 

Keith let out a low growl in the back of his throat as he surged forward, deepening the kiss. Shiro let out an _oof_ of surprise, fingers curling around the back of his neck.

“I’m inexperienced, not immature or unsure,” Keith whispered against his lips.

“I don’t want to take advantage of you. I don’t want you to think that all I want from you is sex.”

Keith’s dick twitched at that three letter word falling from Shiro’s pouty lips. Fuck.

“Take advantage of me, please. God. Or let me do it to you. I promise I’ll still respect you in the morning.”

Shiro groaned, the fingers of his prosthetic digging into Keith’s lower back as Shiro nosed at his cheek. “You can’t just say things like that. God, Keith.”

“Why not?” Keith asked, sucking on the side of Shiro’s mouth since it was the only bit he could easily reach. 

“Because it makes me want to do things, and I wanna...I wanna do this right. I want to take you on dates and make you feel special.”

 _How are you real?_ Keith thought, his entire body flushing with desire from the simple act of Shiro’s fingers burning through the cotton of his shirt at the back and caressing along the base of his neck. He couldn’t imagine what it might feel like to have Shiro’s hands on him in other places, or to be able to get his hands on Shiro. Fuck, he was pretty sure he might come on the spot just being able to look at Shiro naked.

“You can do those things too. They’re not mutually exclusive,” Keith said, bracing his hands on Shiro’s chest. He could feel the erratic racing of Shiro’s heart beating beneath his palms, the undeniable proof of the effect he was having on him making Keith’s head spin. “Just because I haven’t had sex doesn’t mean I need rose petals or to be treated like it's the 1800s and I’m incapable of holding property titles.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. I just,” Shiro sighed, blowing the floof from his eyes, “I just don’t want to fuck this up.”

“You don’t wanna fuck this up?” Keith echoed, once again taking a trip into the twilight zone. Shiro. Perfect, handsome, kind to the fucking core Shiro was worried about being the one to mess things up.

“I don’t date a lot. I found out early on that a lot of times people like the idea of me more than they like _me_. I know sometimes people think they know everything about me from my channel, and it’s not that its a lie but...”

“But there’s more to you,” Keith finished.

Shiro nodded. “Sometimes it’s easier not to show the hard days. Or the boring ones.”

“I like you,” Keith told him, overcome with the need to reassure him. “A lot. In case I didn’t mentioned it.”

Shiro’s smile slowly began to return. “You might’ve mentioned it once or twice.”

“Speaking of things we’ve mentioned. How about you make good on that promise to be a gentleman and walk me to my apartment?”

Shiro let the tips of his fingers slip beneath Keith’s shirt, the metal of the prosthetic like ice but the touch decidedly sweet. “Then what?”

“Then I want you to come inside and be the opposite of a gentleman.”

Shiro bit down on his bottom lip, groaning as he leaned forward and thunked his head down against Keith’s shoulder. “What are you doing to me?”

“Nothing. _Yet_ ,” Keith laughed, surprised at the fact that he wasn’t more nervous about this. Then again, it wasn’t as if he’d been holding off on sex because of some arbitrary moral ground or because he wanted to wait for some happily ever after marriage-type thing he might never get. He’d simply wanted it to be with someone he had a connection with, someone he felt he could trust. “ _Yet._

Shiro pulled back, dropping his other hand down to rest at Keith’s side. “Tease.”

Keith shook his head, taking two big steps back and holding out his hand. “Not teasing if I plan to follow through. And trust me, I plan to really follow through. You ready?”

“Definitely,” Shiro answered, pushing off the table. Though to Keith’s monumental disappointment Shiro didn’t take his hand but instead had to use both arms to pick up the giant lion leaving no free hand for Keith. He resisted the urge to frown or suggest they leave the lion here.

Of course by the time they finally managed to get back to Shiro’s car Keith very much wished he had suggested leaving the fucking lion. It was so massive Shiro couldn’t rest another big hand on his back or entwine their fingers, and they got stopped multiple times on the way to the car by kids asking to look at it. And Shiro, ever the good guy, stopped and let each one them look at it every single time. And alright, watching Shiro bend down to show off his lion to that last wide-eyed little boy in the stroller had been one of the cutest fucking things Keith had ever seen with his own two eyes. But it had also been torture watching Shiro wrap his arm around the damn lion when Keith wanted those arms wrapped around him.

As if that weren’t frustrating enough, the stuffed lion was so big they’d been forced to wait through three elevators in order to fit themselves inside, which was fifteen minutes of Keith’s life he would never recover. Fifteen minutes he’d been forced to spend awkwardly willing down his eager erection as he stared at Shiro’s ass and gave random strangers tight-lipped smiles while trying to pretend that he wasn’t beginning to feel jealous of a four-foot stuffed lion.

“Hey, can you get the keys from my pocket?” Shiro asked once they were finally standing beside Shiro’s car. At Keith’s raised eyebrow Shiro blushed. “What? I don’t wanna put Red on the ground. It’s dirty!” As if to prove his point his lips turned down in a frown as he kicked at the cement flooring. 

“Red?” Keith echoed, trying to keep the laughter out of his voice. First Shiro named his black cat _Black,_ and now this. It was ridiculous and also slightly adorable. 

“Yeah, well it needed a name.”

“Uh huh,” Keith laughed, not at all bothered by the turn of events as he let his fingers slide down Shiro’s backside and into Shiro’s back pocket, giving his ass a playful squeeze as he pretended to fish for the keys. “Because it’s red?”

“No,” Shiro said with a noticeable catch in his voice. “Because of you.”

Keith’s eyes flew up to Shiro’s, hand still shoved in Shiro’s back pocket. Fuck. 

“I know, that’s kind of cheesy and stuff but—” Keith fisted his hand around the keys and yanked them out, not letting Shiro finish.

“We should leave. _Now_ ,” Keith interrupted, unlocking the car and pulling the door open with more force than necessary.

Shiro cleared his throat and nodded. “You have incredible ideas.”

Keith considered it his greatest act of self-restraint in history when ten seconds later instead of simply shoving the lion into the trunk, Shiro instead carefully buckled Red into the backseat with an actual seatbelt and, Keith managed to not bang his head into the car door. Admittedly, the only reason he was able to resist was because something in his stomach swooped with affection at the idea of Shiro being so fond of something Keith had won for him.

Keith was barely aware of the drive back to his apartment, too busy trying not to breathe too loud while moving his hand from his lap to near the cup holder wondering where to put it. Shiro seemed to sense his uncertainty and took pity on him, removing his right hand from the steering wheel only long enough to reach for Keith’s hand and stretch it across the center console so it was resting atop the swell of Shiro’s thigh.

Exhaling a shuddering breath Keith let the tension in his body go, shooting Shiro a smile and giving his thigh a playful squeeze. 

It was a miracle they even managed to make it from the visitor parking up to Keith’s apartment with the way he and Shiro seemed to alternate halting their movements to cop a feel or steal a kiss. It was ridiculous—Keith was an adult for fuck’s sake—and yet he couldn’t contain the almost childlike euphoria that overtook him every time Shiro’s lips touched his. He’d often made fun of kids at his high school for acting like lovesick puppies every time they saw their boyfriend or girlfriend, but he thought maybe he understood it better now, unable to get his face to stop smiling as Shiro laughed into the back of his neck as Keith fumbled with his house key, barely managing to get it into keyhole and get the door open.

They stumbled inside, Keith suddenly acutely aware of the fact that he’d not expected to be bringing anyone home tonight. There was a half-eaten bag of beef jerky and an empty soda can on his coffee table along with several well-read mechanic magazines. The couch had all the pillows shoved into the corner where he’d been cocooned playing video games the night before, and his kitchen sink was piled high with three days’ worth of dishes. He racked his brain trying to remember what state he’d left his bedroom in and prayed that he’d at least thrown his dirty socks and underwear into the laundry hamper in his closet.

“So uh, this is my place. I’d like to say it doesn’t normally look like this but,” he trailed off with a shrug, shoving his hands into his pockets, suddenly self-conscious. He’d never actually brought anyone home with him before, and the intimacy of letting someone into the one place that belonged to him and him alone was not lost on him.

“It’s nice,” Shiro told him. “Homey.”

Keith tried to look at it from an outsider’s perspective. The mantle above the fireplace was covered in an array of photos—Keith with his dad the first time he’d taken him to the desert to ride motorbikes on his thirteenth birthday; he and Lance at their college graduation; and the one photo his dad had given him of his mom before he died. There was only one bookshelf crammed with his sparse DVD collection, some books, and the few keepsakes from his dad he’d kept out of storage, including the fireman’s helmet he’d been wearing when he died.

He felt more exposed than if he’d been standing there naked.

“It’s not a lot.”

Shiro smiled softly as he closed the gap between them, his hands resting at Keith’s waist. “I love it. You don’t need to impress me, you know. I was gone for you the minute you took off your helmet. Then I got to know you, and I was really gone.”

“Oh well, that’s—that’s good,” Keith breathed.

“Did you still want to show me your room?” Shiro asked. “We could just watch TV if you changed your mind, or order in some takeout.”

“No, I mean yes. _Yes._ I definitely still want to,” Keith insisted, beginning to walk them both backwards. Shiro followed his lead easily.

“I’ll take you on the grand tour that’s my kitchen,” Keith said, pointing over his shoulder at the small kitchen that was technically part of the living room. “That’s the bathroom,” he said with a jerk of his head. “And this is the bedroom which I’m praying I cleaned.”

Shiro laughed. “It’s okay if you didn’t.”

“You’re not the only one who wants to make sure someone gets what they deserve,” Keith said softly, kicking the door open with the heel of his shoe. The bed was unmade, his pillows on the floor and his desk a complete mess. But the closet doors were slid shut, and there was thankfully no dirty underwear or wads of used Kleenex on the floor.

“God, you’re sweet,” Shiro whispered, cupping Keith’s face with his hands and leaning down to steal his lips in a kiss so gentle it made Keith’s toes curl. Shiro’s lips were soft, his breath warm as he opened his mouth and drew Keith’s bottom lip inside, drawing a sound from Keith that he was absolutely certain he’d never made in front of another human being. He would’ve been embarrassed if he wasn’t already so turned on he wanted to cry.

“Shiro,” Keith groaned, hands fisting uselessly in the front of Shiro’s dress shirt hard enough to wrinkle it. 

Shiro pulled back, placing feather-light kisses across the side of Keith’s face. “What do you want, baby? You want me to suck you? Fuck you? Maybe you want to fuck me? Want me to just use my hands on you until you’re a shuddering mess? Whatever you want, I promise I’m very, very interested too.”

Keith slammed his eyes shut and groaned. How did Shiro’s voice sound so sweet when he was saying such dirty things? Keith wasn’t sure how he was supposed to say what he wanted when just thinking about any one of those things made his dick twitch. If someone had told him being called baby would make him unsure if he wanted to cry or scream he would’ve called them insane, and yet here they were. God, he hoped Shiro said it again.

“Something else maybe?” Shiro asked, kissing the spot just below Keith’s ear. “I know you’re not scared to speak your mind so don’t be afraid to tell me. Please. I wanna make you feel so good.”

“All of it. Fuck I want to do all of it,” Keith bit out.

Shiro laughed softly against his neck, his chest rumbling. “Me too, baby. But we can’t do it all at once. What do you want first?”

Keith closed his eyes and tipped his head back as Shiro continued to suck at the hollow of his throat. _Baby._ Fuck. He liked that more than he thought possible, not to mention the fact that the idea of Shiro on his knees made Keith’s head spin, and the thought of fucking Shiro was so hot Keith was afraid he might come before he even got his dick inside of Shiro. Keith couldn’t articulate what it felt like to imagine Shiro pressing him into the sheets and fucking _him_.

“I, uh,” Keith started, gasping when Shiro sucked harder, “want you to fuck me. Fuck.”

Shiro groaned loudly, dropping his forehead against Keith’s shoulder, which Keith took as a good sign that Shiro wanted the same thing.

“Have you ever fingered yourself?” Shiro asked, pulling back to look down at Keith.

Heat spread across Keith’s face as he thought of the almost-empty bottle of lube and dildo hidden in his bedside table. “Yes. I’m a virgin not a monk.”

Shiro grinned. “That’s good to know. I can’t say I have a religious kink.”

“Fuck you,” Keith laughed.

“If you’re good you can. Next time.”

“Jesus fucking christ.”

“If we’re going to be having sex you can definitely just call me Shiro. I’m not sure I’ve earned the title of god just yet. I mean I can try but—”

“Oh my god, shut up and get naked,” Keith snorted, moving his hands to the hem of his own shirt and yanking it off to throw it carelessly on the floor.

“Yes, sir,” Shiro said in mock seriousness, hands immediately going to the buttons on his shirt.

 _Sir_. Jesus, was everything Shiro said going to turn him on? Keith stopped moving, the button on his jeans half undone as he watched Shiro’s massive hands deftly undo the tiny buttons with care. Fucking fuck. Those fingers were going to be inside of him soon. He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly. When he opened them again the shirt was falling from Shiro’s broad shoulders to reveal an expanse of pale, muscled skin that made Keith’s dick, if possible, even harder. Shiro looked up from his undressing to see Keith watching him and pulled his bottom lip between his teeth as he kicked off his shoes and moved his hands to his pants.

He paused, fingers on the buttons as his eyes roved over Keith’s body and down to where Keith’s hands rested on his own zipper. _Oh._ He wanted them to undress together. Keith nodded, though Shiro’s eyes were on his hands and not his face as he tugged down the zipper while Shiro did the same. Keith had never given much thought to undressing as foreplay, but watching Shiro hook his hands into his pants and slowly shove them down to reveal his hard cock nestled among dark curls and thick thighs made Keith think that watching Shiro undress was like a sex act of its own. His own hands felt clumsy and awkward as he kicked his shoes across the room and shoved his jeans and boxers off. Shiro watched him the entire time—wide eyes and shallow breathing making it clear how affected he was by Keith’s nakedness—and Keith found it settled his nerves to have such visible proof that Shiro liked what he saw.

“Gonna do more than just stare?” Keith asked, inching his way towards the bed and then dropping down. He scooted himself back, eyes wide as Shiro began to follow him.

“You’re gorgeous, you know that?” Shiro said, knees on the bed and the mattress dipping with his weigh as he settled himself, kneeling over Keith.

“You are. Fuck, you are,” Keith shot back, barely able to contain his moan at the sensation of Shiro’s cock brushing against his. Shiro seemed aware of what had caused the expletive and ground his hips down purposefully this time and Keith lost all sense of coherence. He opened his mouth to say something, though what he honestly didn’t know, except then Shiro expertly rolled his hips again, and Keith had to grab the base of his cock to keep from coming.

“What’s wrong?” shiro asked, stopping immediately.

“Nothing,” Keith insisted, shaking his head. “Just...I don’t wanna come yet. Wanted you to fuck me.”

“Oh, is that all,” Shiro said looking pleased as he gently pried Keith’s fingers off his cock. “It’ll feel better if you’re really relaxed. Lots of foreplay helps. Besides you’ll get hard again. Trust me.”

Then he braced his hands on either side of Keith’s head and captured his lips in a searing kiss as he began to rock his hips again. This time Keith didn’t bother trying to contain the sounds he made, his hands scrambling to find hold in the meaty flesh of Shiro’s ass as their cocks slid together. It was impossible for Keith to worry he was doing something wrong, reacting too much or not enough when Shiro kept whispering words of praise about how good he felt, about the sounds he made or the way he smelled all while he rutted against Keith and moaned unabashedly as if it was the hottest thing that had ever happened to him.

All too soon Keith felt heat pooling in his belly, legs tingling, and before he could even give Shiro a warning he was spilling his release between their writhing bodies and letting out a scream that Shiro swallowed like a man dying.

“Hot. Fuck, you’re so hot,” Shiro whispered against his flushed skin as he kissed every bit of Keith’s face and neck and chest he could reach, as Keith let out an undignified grunt and flopped his hands down onto the mattress.

“You too,” Keith muttered, eyes still shut. That seemed like the kind of thing he should be saying right now even if it required more brain cells than he felt like he had.

“You okay?” Shiro asked, lifting Keith’s right hand and pressing a single kiss to each one of his finger tips. 

Keith cracked an eye open. “I’m fine. No god title for you yet,” he lied.

“Mmm, I better get on that then, huh? I’ve got my work it out for me.” He picked up Keith’s other hand to lavish that one with attention too. “You have condoms? Lube?”

Keith nodded. “In the drawer.”

“That’s good,” Shiro said, gently setting Keith’s hand down before leaning across the bed and pulling open the drawer. It only occurred to Keith then what was in there besides condoms and lube. The giant, rainbow and glitter covered dildo Lance had bought him for his twentieth birthday. It was gaudy and shiny and as much as Keith hated the way it looked, it certainly got the job done, and despite telling Lance he’d thrown it away he most certainly hadn’t. 

“I guess I don’t need to ask if you’ve ever had anything but fingers up your ass,” he teased, holding up the dildo. It flopped around in Shiro’s hand looking even more ridiculous than usual against the sleek metal of his prosthetic. God, Keith was going to kill Lance.

“Oh my god,” Keith groaned as he covered his face with his hands, his next words coming out garbled. “Put that thing away!”

Shiro laughed, dropping it back into the drawer with a thud. Keith cracked his fingers open and watched as Shiro continued to dig around the drawer finally pulling out the tube of lubricant and a condom. He might’ve been embarrassed but not enough to miss a chance to catch a glimpse of Shiro’s pert backside.

“You only have regular,” Shiro said when he’d situated himself back down beside Keith. “Extra durable condoms are better for anal. Regular condoms are more likely to break during sex.”

“Ah fuck,” Keith sighed. “I didn’t know. Not like I’ve ever used them.”

“I think I’ve got one in my wallet,” Shiro said, the bed shifting as he stood. Keith rolled onto his side and watch the flex of his backside as he walked, noticing the dimples in his ass seconds before he bent over to rummage through his pants for his wallet and give Keith a perfect view of the impressive cock dangling between his spread legs. Fuck.

“Aha,” Shiro said triumphantly, returning to the bed a moment later with the condom held between his fingers. “I did.”

“You uh, always carry condoms around with you?” Keith asked, doing his best to sound casual. He knew it wasn’t fair to be jealous of any past lovers Shiro might’ve had. He was a few years older than Keith and likely way more experienced. On top of that he was hot as fuck, single, and semi-famous. Of course it made sense he’d be ready for sex at a moment's notice. He’d told Keith he didn’t date a lot, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have sex. 

“Yeah, of course,” Shiro said, ripping open the condom then setting it on the bed. He reached for the lube next, uncapping it and turning a soft smile on Keith.

“Of course,” Keith said, suddenly overcome with a wave of doubt. He’d insisted he was ready for this but suddenly the idea of being one more notch on someone’s belt stung. It wasn’t that he thought his first time had to be special, he’d just wanted it to be with someone special.

“Wait, what's wrong?” Shiro asked, setting the lube down on the bed and stroking his fingers across Keith’s thigh. Keith exhaled, trying to stop his body from trembling.

“Nothing.”

“You’re not a very good liar,” Shiro said kindly. “I understand if you’re not comfortable telling me some things. I know this is...we’re new.” He paused, seeming to consider his words. “But I’d like you to be comfortable telling me things. I want you to be someone you can trust. If you’ll let me.”

“Do you...uh, replace the condom often?” Keith asked quietly.

“I mean, often enough. I definitely make sure to check the expiration dates if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said, apparently not quite registering Keith’s meaning.

“That’s not exactly what I meant.”

“Then what did you— _oh!_ ”

“Shit, sorry. It’s stupid. I don’t expect you to like be celibate or something.” Keith felt his erection beginning to wilt, wishing he could close his eyes and disappear. Dammit, he knew he’d say something stupid eventually.

“Keith, that’s been in my wallet for months.”

Keith forced open his eyes. Shiro wasn’t looking at him as if he were stupid or pathetic. If anything he looked like he thought Keith was cute which was a feeling Keith had no idea how to handle.

“It doesn’t matter if you did. I wouldn’t think less of you if you had a lot of sex,” Keith said, “I just...I uh—I wasn’t sure what this was for you. Not that I’m asking you for like a marriage proposal or something I just, shit. I’m not saying this right. You probably think I’m an idiot.”

Keith pulled his knees to his chest and resisted the urge to sigh heavily. Only he could manage to ruin the mood with a naked Adonis in his bed. He didn't have long to emote though because then Shiro’s fingers were on his chin, lifting his face up. “I think you’re cute.”

As if to prove his point he shuffled forward on his knees and kissed Keith, slow and soft, their lips barely touching.

“I don’t know exactly what this is either. I know I’ve never felt like this before. I’ve never been so drawn to someone in my entire life. I’ve never slept with someone on the first date. I’ve never been so certain I wanted as many dates as I might be lucky enough to get this early.”

“Oh,” Keith breathed, still dazed.

“Which is a very roundabout way of saying that while I know it might be hard to believe, in some ways this is as new for me as it is for you. Maybe not the actual sex but the other stuff, yeah definitely. This is completely uncharted territory for me.”

Shiro dropped his hand, his eyes wide as he looked at Keith. Right, this was about the time where Keith was supposed to say something.

“Do you believe in the red string theory” Keith asking, reaching out to trail his fingertips along Shiro’s upturned forearm. 

There was a long pause before Shiro spoke, his voice shaky. “I didn’t before I met you.”

Keith closed his eyes and exhaled, lights dancing behind his eyelids like the solar flare he’d once seen on a space documentary he’d watched when he was nine. It was bright, his body aflame, and if he didn’t move right this second he knew he was going to implode.

Keith’s eyes shot open and before Shiro could say a word Keith was surging forward, slamming their lips together as he yanked Shiro down on top of him.

If Shiro was surprised he didn’t show it, letting out a soft whimper that made Keith’s heart ache as he crawled atop Keith pushing him back into the messy sheets.

“How are you real?” Shiro whispered in between kisses, his body moving against Keith’s but slower than before. There was no frantic desperation, just slow, reverent movements that made Keith feel made of glass. Shiro’s skin was sticky with sweat and come but he didn't seem to mind one bit as he kissed Keith until they could barely breathe, and then he kissed him some more.

Time lost meaning as Shiro scrambled for the lube without breaking the kiss, the sound of the cap uncorking still echoing in Keith’s ears when a warm finger slipped into the crevice of his ass. The finger dragged over until it found Keith’s entrance, stroking over the furrowed skin and lathering it in lube. It should’ve been uncomfortable or strange to have someone else touching him there for the first time, but instead all Keith could do was focus on remembering how to breathe as Shiro ravished his mouth before slipping a finger past the tight ring of muscle.

“Fuck,” Keith cried, fingers digging into Shiro’s sides hard enough to leave marks.

“Relax, baby. I’ll make it so good for you. I wanna make you feel so good.” 

_You already are_ Keith thought, screwing his eyes shut as Shiro mouthed down his jawline and the slope of his neck to press sloppy, open mouthed kisses across his collar bones as he pumped one of his impressively long fingers in and out of Keith’s body. 

One finger hadn’t burned, but two did a little. It was a good burn though, just this side of pleasurable discomfort made all the better by the fact that Shiro’s fingers were strong but gentle as they worked in and out of him as if he already knew exactly how to touch Keith. It took Keith a good minute to realize at some point his legs had fallen wide open and his hips were arched up in a wordless plea for _more_.

“Shit,” Shiro mumbled, wiping the floof from his forehead with the back of his free hand as his mouth moved lower down Keith’s body, kissing his way across his chest to suck at the skin above his belly button as he began to scissor his fingers stretching Keith wide.

“I’m ready, fuck, please,” Keith begged, his cock now so hard against the flat of his belly he was afraid he might come a second time before Shiro even got to stick his dick inside of him.

“Soon, I promise, just a little more. I don’t wanna hurt you,” Shiro whispered, nuzzling his nose into Keith’s belly button. Keith’s body twitched in laughter that quickly turned into a moan as Shiro managed to wedge a third finger inside his body. The initial burn was sharp but it faded quickly as Shiro pumped his lube soaked fingers in and out at at a slow and steady pace.

Just when Keith felt about ninety percent certain he was either going to die or ejaculate prematurely without his cock being touched, Shiro withdrew his fingers and sat back on his heels. Keith tried to catch his breathing, lifting himself up onto his elbows and watching with wide eyes as Shiro took out the condom and began to roll it down his own cock, which was fully erect and leaking at the tip. Shiro was, as expected based on his overall height and girth, well-endowed and Keith decided Shiro’d had the right idea about taking his time making sure Keith could take that. Not even his over-sized dildo could hold a candle to Shiro, and Keith’s stomach fluttered with anticipation when Shiro crawled back between his legs.

“It’s a little easier the first time on your hands and knees,” Shiro said in a steady voice, a sharp contrast to the barely imperceptible tremble of his hand against Keith’s knee. 

“Okay,” Keith whispered, scrambling onto his hands and knees and shoving his face into his folded arms. As much as he wanted to look at Shiro it was probably safer this way. Keith wasn’t sure he would be able to last if he had a front row seat to the sight of Shiro’s body sliding into his own. As it was at least this way he could screw his eyes shut and pray he last more than fifteen seconds.

“Just let me know if it hurts or you need me to stop. Or uh, if something feels good and you want more you can tell me that too,” Shiro told him, his hands caressing Keith’s lower back and over the swell of his ass. “Wider,” Shiro whispered against the back of his thigh, nudging Keith’s legs open. Keith felt wanton and on display with ass up in the air like that, but more surprising than the feeling itself was how much Keith liked it. He hadn’t thought it was possible to feel more turned on, but being naked and spread out and knowing Shiro’s eyes were roaming over him made him feel powerful and powerless all at once.

“Shiro,” he mumbled.

Shiro made an indistinguishable noise, his fingers purposeful as he spread Keith’s ass wide open and lined up his cock. The tip of it was hard and hot, and Keith’s body tensed instinctively.

“Breathe,” Shiro told him, rubbing a soothing circle on his lower back as he slowly began to press past the the tight ring of muscle. Keith did as instructed, closing his eyes and focusing on nothing but the feeling of Shiro’s strength behind him.

Keith’s mouth fell open in a silent gasp, his eyes watering as Shiro continued to move slowly. Then he was fully seated inside, his hips flush against Keith’s ass, and Keith had never known a feeling so grounding or out of body. Shiro dropped his hands onto either side of Keith’s head, his chest to Keith’s back as he nosed away the loose curls at the back of his neck. Shiro’s breath was warm, his lips warmer, and Keith wasn’t sure if he wanted to beg Shiro to stay like that or beg him to move to finally—fucking finally—know what it felt like to be fucked.

He was caged in on all sides by Shiro, completely full of him and surrounded by him as if the world began and ended with them and them alone. 

“God, baby,” Shiro said breathlessly, panting into Keith’s shoulder. 

“You can move,” Keith told him, turning his head enough to speak clearly. 

Shiro huffed, kissing the top of his shoulder before slowly pulling out a bit and then pressing back in. The drag was heady, the fullness intensified, and Keith knew then he absolutely wanted Shiro to keep doing that.

“More,” Keith gasped, “More.” More what he wasn’t entirely sure, just knew it wasn’t enough.

“God, you’re… _god_ ,” Shiro murmured as his lips descended unexpectedly on Keith’s, stealing a hurried kiss before Shiro once again began to pulling out before thrusting back in. Shifting his body, Keith moved to lift himself onto his elbows, needing to change the position enough where he could rock back to meet Shiro’s thrusts. In turn, Shiro’s hands moved from the bed to Keith’s body, roaming over his back and sides in reverential touches.

Keith lost the ability to form words as Shiro’s thruts began to pick up speed, the burn replaced by a soul-deep ache to be filled. His hands clawed at the sheets before fisting in the wrinkled cotton at the same time that Shiro’s massive hands settled low on his hips. Shiro’s grip was firm but undeniably gently as he pulled Keith’s ass toward him with each downward thrust making him bottom out on every turn. The blood rushed to Keith’s face, his ears ringing and his mouth falling open in a strangled half attempt at a whimper. It was too much. He could barely see, barely think, could focus on nothing but the heavy weight and fullness as Shiro fucked him slow and deep in a way that left Keith in absolutely no doubt that he would be ruined for anyone else ever again.

 _Was sex always like this?_ he wondered, struggling to do anything except arch and writhe and moan beneath Shiro’s skillful ministrations. He didn’t understand how people didn’t just stay in their houses and spend all day fucking if this was what sex was like. 

He was so close, his dick hanging hard and heavy between his legs and leaking on the bed beneath him. His hips rocked, desperate for more friction there but unable to find the words to convey what he needed. Shiro seemed to pick up on it quickly though, his left hand skating around Keith’s front and wrapping around his cock as he continued to fuck Keith without pause. 

Later when Keith had time to pause and reflect he was sure he was going to be embarrassed about the sound that came out of his mouth when Shiro’s strong, warm fingers encircled his neglected cock. But since it was all Keith could do at that moment to stay conscious he had to settle for dropping his head down between his shoulders and pretending he hadn’t actually screamed as he came fast and hard, his come splattering the red sheets in spurts of white. 

Shiro slowed his thrusts but didn’t stop as he stroked Keith through his release and whispered words of praise. Keith for his part stayed unmoving, his entire body felt made of jello, and he was pretty sure if he tried to move he was going to collapse face first into a pile of his own come.

“Close,” Shiro whimpered, his thrusts becoming shorter and more erratic before his hips were stuttering against Keith’s and then suddenly Keith was unexpectedly pulled up and backward leaving his back flush against Shiro’s chest as Shiro buried his face in Keith’s neck and rocked his hips through his own release. 

“Fuck,” Keith grunted, tilting his head back against Shiro’s.

Shiro made a responding noise, his hands stroking over Keith’s stomach soothingly, though whether it was for Shiro’s benefit or Keith’s he had no idea. Either way it nice.

“Is it always like that?” Keith asked, staring at a spot on his ceiling and wondering how long it would be before they could do that again.

“No,” Shiro answered breathlessly. “Not for me anyway.”

“Oh,” Keith whispered, a swell of pride pooling in the pit of his stomach. 

“I think you killed me,” Shiro grunted, placing soft kissing to the juncture of Keith’s neck and shoulder.

“Does that make me the god?” Keith asked seriously.

Shiro laughed. “I like you so much.”

“I like you too,” Keith said. 

“If I asked you if I could come back here tomorrow and pick you up for a breakfast date would you say yes?” Shiro asked, his fingers still stroking across the softest part of Keith’s tummy as if he couldn’t stop himself.

“No.” 

Shiro’s hands stilled, his body going rigid. “Oh, I—”

“I’d say no because I was gonna ask you to stay the night first,” Keith said, turning his head.

Shiro’s eyes widened, his fingers digging into Keith’s tummy before he closed the distance in a kiss. When he pulled back he looked at Keith and blushed. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Keith laughed, unused to his face being so fucking close to someone else's, though considering Shiro’s cock was still inside of him and they were a sticky mess that really wasn’t the most intimate thing they’d done tonight.

“We’re messy.”

“We are,” Keith agreed. “Are you hungry? I’ve got mac and cheese.”

“Oh, mac and cheese. You know the way to my heart don’t you?” he teased.

“We could shower and eat and then after if you wanted we could uh, try that other thing.”

“What other thing?” Shiro asked, nuzzling his nose into Keith’s cheek like cat and resuming his tummy stroking. _Shiro was a cuddler_. Keith wasn’t sure why it surprised him so much but it was the good kind of surprise.

“The thing where I fuck _you_ ,” he blurted.

“Yes,” Shiro said enthusiastically, his fingers lightly tickling Keith’s stomach. “Definitely yes.”

 

****

**~~~~~~~**

Keith groaned, slowly coming to awareness as he stretched his left arm out beneath the pillow. It wasn’t until he attempted to stretch out his legs but was unable to because they were entwined with someone else's that the last few hours came rushing back to him in a flurry of hedonistic memories.

His eyelids fluttered open to find Shiro still there with him, snoring softly on the extra pillow. His face was only a few inches from Keith’s as he slumbered soundly—tufts of white hair fanned across the red pillowcase and his mouth hanging open slighting. He lifted himself up onto his elbow to peer down at Shiro. 

The reason behind the soreness in his muscles—and especially his ass—was immediately cleared and he was glad Shiro wasn’t awake to witness the flush he felt spreading across his face as he remembered collapsing into bed after their shower and pressing Shiro back into the bed. Shiro had proven to be just as vocal and attentive when being fucked as when he was the one doing the fucking. Praise fell from his lips as easily as vocalizations of pleasure at the ways Keith touched him, not at all shy about letting Keith know he liked what he was doing. Keith’s tentative touches had grown bold as Shiro had writhed and begged beneath him.

The tipping point for Keith had come when Shiro had crawled back, pulling his knees to his chest and whispering, “I’m ready for you”

It’d been all Keith could do not to come then and there—the sight of Shiro spreading himself wide for Keith, halfway to ruined and begging Keith to finish the job almost too much for Keith to withstand. By some miracle he’d managed not to come the second the tip of his cock had slid between the tight heat of Shiro’s clenched legs, the memory of those thick thighs and strong muscles quivering beneath him was something Keith would never forget.

Shiro groaned in his sleep, throwing his arm out into the empty space between them and bringing Keith back to the present and the very attractive and sleepy occupant of the bed who was beginning to pout as he patted around blindly for Keith.

“I’m right here,” Keith laughed, dropping his head down onto his pillow and scooting closer.

“Can’t sleep?” Shiro whispered, his eyes opening slowly. His voice was heavy with sleep and another wave of fondness assaulted Keith. It shouldn’t be possible for someone who was half-asleep with the textbook definition of bedhead to be so adorable.

“Not used to sleeping with someone,” Keith admitted, giving in to the urge to let his fingers stroke along the inside of Shiro’s left wrist.

“Oh, I can sleep on the couch if you want?” He shifted, almost as if preparing to move.

“No,” Keith blurted out, wrapping his finger around Shiro’s wrist. The delicate pulse point throbbed beneath his thumb. “Stay, please. It’s just different, but a good different.”

“Okay,” Shiro breathed, apparently appeased by Keith’s words. He smiled sleepily, nuzzling his way across the pillow until his face was only inches from Keith’s, then he pressed a chaste kiss to his lips.

“You don’t seem to have any trouble sleeping,” Keith observed, still holding Shiro’s wrist and making no move to change that.

“I was an army brat. We were constantly moving and sometimes we didn’t even stay in one place long enough to get my bedroom set up. I got into the habit of falling asleep anywhere out of necessity, which you’d think was an asset but really bothered my teachers when I would fall asleep in the middle of class.”

“So you sleep like a bear.”

“I mean, I like to think I’m a little less hairy than a bear, cuter too,” Shiro laughed.

Keith was spared answering by the untimely and embarrassingly loud growl of his stomach.

“Hungry?” Shiro asked.

“No,” Keith fibbed, his stomach growling again. He scrunched his nose up. “Okay, maybe.”

“Oh my god, your stomach sounds like an angry kitten.”

“Shut up, it does not,” Keith laughed, turning to bury his face in the pillow so Shiro wouldn’t see him blush. Shiro for his part seemed to find the entire thing hilarious, nosing his face against Keith’s cheek while meowing. Keith let out a bark of laughter, rolling onto his side to face Shiro.

“Are you always like this?” 

Shiro’s lips pursed, his face contorting into a mask of seriousness. “What, perfect?”

Keith laughed louder, his bare leg rubbing against Shiro’s as his body shook with his amusement. 

“Seriously though, I feel bad. We missed dinner because of me,” Shiro said, lifting his hand to brush the hair from Keith’s eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“I mean, last time I checked there were two of us involved in the copious amounts of fucking so we probably share that blame equally. Besides even if I could somehow get my hands on a time machine I still would’ve rather eaten you than the mac and cheese.”

Shiro’s cheeks turned pink and Keith mentally made note of the the fact that outside of actually having sex Shiro apparently couldn’t talk about it without getting shy. 

“So, you still gonna cook for me?” Shiro asked, twinning some of Keith’s hair around his finger.

“Depends on if making boxed macaroni and cheese counts as cooking.”

“It definitely does,” Shiro said, releasing the hair around his finger and instead slipping his entire hand into Keith’s hair to cup the back of his head as he pulled him in for another kiss. Their lips gliding together slowly, like two dancers following a rhythm. Keith was already mentally debating which one of them got to get fucked the next time when Shiro placed a palm on his chest and broke the kiss.

“Food. You need food,” Shiro said.

Keith’s lips turned down in a frown. “I want you again.”

“God,” Shiro breathed, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath before opening them again. “Me too, baby, but food first. Then fucking. You need to eat.”

Keith had half a mind to tell Shiro he skipped meals all the time and wasn’t in need of a fainting couch, but there was something undeniably sweet about Shiro trying to take care of him. It made something warm spread throughout Keith’s body as he fought back a smile and instead of fighting against it like he did with Lance he found himself nodding. “Alright.”

“Chop chop then,” Shiro said, playful patting him on the ass beneath the sheet before rolling out of bed.

Keith’s eyes followed Shiro the dark, acutely aware of the way those sinuous curves and muscles felt beneath his hands. Despite the late hour the room was aglow with the lights from the gas station across the street, casting shadows through the half-closed blind. Keith exhaled slowly, reminding himself this was not a dream as his eyes followed the rise and fall Shiro’s bare ass as he padded across the room in search of his discarded boxers. Clearly unaware of Keith’s gaze he began to hum to himself as bent down and grabbed them, pulling the tight black underwear up and over his thick thighs and the generous swell of his butt. Fuck, Shiro was beautiful. 

When he turned around he clearly expected to see Keith doing the same as him, and his lips turned down in what could only be described as an actual pout when he realized that Keith was still laying in the bed instead of getting dressed.

“Aren’t you coming?”

Keith nodded, rolling onto his stomach and resting his chin on his hands, unable to take his eyes off the way the snug fitting-underwear clung to the flat of Shiro’s stomach and accentuated just how meaty his thighs were. “Give me a moment, I’m enjoying the view.”

“Oh,” Shiro huffed, reaching up to ruffle his hair self-consciously. For someone who looked like they should’ve been a model, Shiro seemed perpetually surprised by compliments.

Keith was pretty sure he could happily spend the next half hour doing nothing but watching Shiro, but his stomach apparently had other ideas as it growled loudly enough that Keith dragged himself from bed. Too lazy to search for his own discarded underwear he went straight to the dresser, wanked open the top drawer and pulled out the only pair of boxers he saw—a loose fitting pair white pair with little hippos wearing red bow ties Lance had got him for Christmas last year. Normally he only wore them for sleeping, but beggars couldn’t be choosers and it was these or make macaroni and cheese naked.

“Don’t laugh,” Keith grumbled, stepping into the boxers and refusing to look at Shiro until they were on.

“Not laughing,” Shiro said, reaching out to run his pointer finger along the waistband. True to his word he was not laughing but the smile on his face and crinkled nose made it clear how amused he was. “So you like hippos, huh?”

“My favorite animal,” he admitted, ignoring the flush he felt spreading across his chest as he ducked his head and made his way towards the door.

“That’s cute. I’ll be sure and remember that,” Shiro said as he followed quietly behind him. 

The rest of Keith’s apartment was shrouded in darkness and he took a moment to appreciate the utter calm and quiet blanketing the room before he flipped the lights back on as they wandered into the kitchen. It didn’t escape his notice that instead of just the sound of his own feet there was an echoing step of footsteps. Instead of being awkward it simply filled Keith with a sort of comfort as he turned to give Shiro a small smile before moving to the pantry in search of food.

“You ever made mac and cheese at midnight before? Shiro asked.

“Nope. First time for everything though,” Keith answered, his back still turned as he rummaged around until he found the box of mac and cheese buried behind a can of peas that he most definitely didn’t remember buying. When he turned back around it was to see Shiro leaning against the countertop and watching him with a fond smile. It hit Keith once again that all of this was really happening. It wasn’t just some crazy dream. Not only had he lost his virginity, he’d done it with his crush—someone as incredible as he was handsome—who was standing in the middle of his kitchen in the middle of the night after hours of sex in nothing but a pair of tight boxer briefs and looking like an actual Adonis. Keith couldn’t have made this shit up if he tried.

“And uh, how have all those firsts been?” Shiro asked, pushing off the counter and moving to crowd into Keith’s space. He let his hand rest on Keith’s hip, his thumb settling itself under the elastic of the waistband. “Were they like you expected?”

“No.” Keith shook his head and swallowed. “Better. So much fucking better.”

The smile that spread across Shiro’s face was something Keith was positive he would dream about for years—something unabashedly full of hope and pride—as he tilted his head down to kiss Keith again. Keith let out a soft sigh, his arms twining themselves around Shiro’s neck. Before he knew what was happening Shiro’s hands were on the back of his thighs hoisting him up. Keith’s noise of surprise was muffled against Shiro’s lips as Shiro lifted him up and off the ground and carried him backwards to deposit his butt on the edge of the kitchen counter.

“Hey there, handsome,” Shiro whispered, resting their foreheads together.

“Hi, show off,” Keith laughed, more turned on than he wanted to admit by Shiro’s unanticipated display of brute strength. He was also unexpectedly turned on by the change in positions, at having a few inches on Shiro and having Shiro standing between his legs looking at him like _that_.

Shiro blushed but smiled. “Did it work?”

“Oh yeah,” Keith nodded, “that display of masculinity and prowess was very impressive. And hot as fuck.”

Shiro’s cheeks pinked. “Good.”

“So you show off a lot, starboy?” Keith asked, grazing his nails across the short hairs at the back of Shiro’s neck—relishing in the tiny shiver that rocked his body, desperate to memorize the things that made Shiro feel good

“Only for someone I really like.” 

“I feel very special,” Keith said, mostly joking. 

Shiro’s face was anything but teasing as he leaned in, his mouth hovering against Keith’s in a not quite kiss that had their lips brushing together. “Good, you should.”

Keith’s breath left him in a bitten off whimper as Shiro dragged his lips across Keith’s in the most fleeting of touches, then just as unexpectedly pulled back, reaching behind him to grab the box of mac and cheese before shaking it in Keith’s face.

“Hungry?” Keith laughed, swiping the box back from him and shaking his head in amusement as he hopped off the counter.

“Might be,” Shiro said innocently. 

Keith snorted. He’d thought maybe Shiro played up his love of macaroni and cheese on his channel as a bit of a gimmick but it appeared his addiction truly ran deep. He shuffled to the oven, pulling it open and taking out a pot.

“You keep your pots in the oven?” 

Keith shrugged, carrying it to the sink and filling it with water. “Where else am I supposed to keep them?”

“Uh, in the pots and pan cabinet. You know here they belong.”

Keith snorted. “Pots and pans cabinet. Aren’t you fancy.”

“Oh shut up,” he laughed, his eyes crinkling at the corners with the width of his smile. “I like things to be in order.”

“I guessed as much from your trunk.”

“Hey, now that came in handy though. Now I have clean clothes to wear today, which means you absolutely can’t tease for being over prepared.”

Keith flipped on the burner before turning his eyes back on Shiro. “I definitely can.”

“I dunno, I mean I think if we’re going to open up the floor for teasing each other about clothing that would make those beauties you’re wearing fair game.” Shiro smiled innocently, his eyes raking across the hippo by Keith’s dick. 

“You play dirty.”

“I play to win,” Shiro laughed, reaching a hand out to tug Keith closer.

“Oh yeah and what is it you hope to win?” Keith asked, his hands splayed on the flat of Shiro’s chest, the slow rise and fall of it as he breathed slowly soothing his racing heart. 

“Your heart,” Shiro said without an ounce of jest.

“Oh my god, you’re so cheesy,” Keith laughed, though the thrill of those words didn’t escape his notice.

“Too much?” Shiro asked, chewing on his bottom lip.

“Maybe just a little bit,” Keith confessed, rising onto his tiptoes to kiss away the pout forming on Shiro’s face at his admission. “But I like you anyway. So much.”

“That’s good because I really like you, and your hippos,” Shiro said, waggling his eyebrows as he pulled at the offending material and grinned.

Keith slung an arm around Shiro’s waist. “We’ve got at least five minutes before the water bottles. We could see if we have time for another first.” 

He waggled his own eyebrows dramatically in imitation of Shiro, earning him a playful pinch on the ass and a chuckle.

“Sounds like fun.”

“Yeah, it does,” Keith agreed, moving Shiro’s hands to his hair as he began to drop to his knees.

Shiro’s eyes widened in surprise, a soft oh falling from his lips as Keith began to tug his boxers down and all Keith could was think how fucking luck he felt. He might not have had a single clue what their future held, but he sure was excited to find out.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on [Tumblr](https://teamtakashi.tumblr.com/) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/goldentruth813).


End file.
